The Chainwork
by 26Chapters
Summary: Four months after Sana'a, Michael is drawn into a game that threatens his family.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1, **Anyone Else.**

* * *

More than she's confused, more than she's wishing for direct, precise and careful answers _with_ believable reasoning, Gretchen Morgan is starting to _fear_ for her life. The fear that she's starting to feel, isn't the one where her nerves are on end, just waiting for the worst to happen. It's not the sort of fear that makes her feel jittery and paranoid either, no. This fear that is starting to rise up inside of her, is a fear that can only be described as an apprehensive mindset, that somehow has her wishing for a different alternative.

It's funny, she thinks to herself as she closes that door to the apartment that she just entered, it's funny how up until now, she didn't believe that there was any universe _beyond_ working for The Company, and then doing years in jail, that would make her start to feel this kind of fear. After all, she's Gretchen Morgan. She's the one woman who's had all sorts of things done to her, endured all things, and coloured her life with all types of outcomes, the worst of which was _never_ death, so why would she believe that this rising fear inside her, would be even minimally possible? Except, here she is, in rising fear.

Only for a second, she leans her back against the door that she just closed, to compose herself and reel herself back in. It's yet another funny thing, how only after leaving the hospital, after having seen what she saw, and hearing what she heard, does she come to experience fear here, back at the apartment. These fear instincts that are suddenly attacking her now, should've done so when she saw the very familiar face of Michael Scofield in the hospital room. But then again, when she thinks about it, having served in The Company, and then in prison, her mind and body have perfected the art of _not_ panicking on the spot, where the enemy easily has an advantage in her panic. But still...

Right now isn't the time for her to be sprouting fear... What she really should be doing, is trying to get to the bottom of this, and then maybe this fear that is flirting with her, trying to reel her in completely, will disappear. And she knows just the person to call. Quickly, she pulls her phone from her grey jacket pocket, just as quickly dialling one of the only two numbers that she has saved in the phone. After the first two long rings, the phone is picked up, bringing the other end of the line to life, and consequently bringing her somewhat of a little relief.

'Alexander Clifford Mahone,' she verbally shakes into the phone without waiting for him to announce himself, 'what the hell in the world did you get me into?'

If she had the time and patience to greet him with pleasantries, she'd afford him the luxury, except, as it stands, she'd just like to do something about this fear that wants to take her over, and he's the primary available person who can start something about it.

'Gretchen,' Alex answers, sounding thoroughly bored, 'that's not my middle name, wherever you got it from.'

Seriously, she mentally scoffs, does she care about his middle name? She pulled that name out of a tasteless side of her brain, to give tremendous effect to the situation at hand. She doesn't care about his middle name, whatever it is or isn't.

'Whatever,' she dismisses carelessly as she steps away from the door. 'I just need to know what the hell did you get me into!'

For clarity, she's generally not one prone to panicking. Immediate panic, from her, no, not really. The years that she's served in The Company, have taught her to not panic, at least not visibly, because it easily clouds judgment. Heck, even prison taught her a thing or two about panicking, and yet, here she is…

'I didn't get you into anything, Gretchen,' Alex scoffs at her response. 'I received your papers, I brought them to the prison and that's it. I didn't get you into anything. None of that had anything to do with me.'

'Yeah, well say what you want,' she replies, 'but I seriously doubt that Michael Scofield is going to accept that.'

'Michael Scofield?' he asks, sounding lost, but still not interested enough to lose the bored air in his voice.

Right now, she could choose to be irritated with Alex for being as uninterested as he is, but on top of fearing for whatever the hell kind of mess she was brought into, she doesn't want to deal with irritation for Alex either. Fresh out of prison, she only has patience for one thing at a time at this stage. She doesn't want to be overwhelmed by feelings when she's out in the free open, because she might just do something spontaneous, that she'll regret.

' _Yes_ ,' she stresses, with closing eyes, ' _that Michael_.'

'Isn't he dead?' Alex wonders, apparently starting to gain interest in the matter now.

Unfortunately, as much as she wanted him to be interested in hearing her out, and explaining this to her, she finds that his sudden interest, is not a good thing to consider. Actually, she feels like it's the beginning of something deeper. Also, his lack of knowledge on the fact that Michael Scofield is alive, isn't comforting to her. If Alex really doesn't know about Michael, then it means that he really doesn't know anymore than she does. What a waste of time it was to call him!

'Catch up, Alex,' she spits, allowing only a little of impatience to slip into her tone, 'he's not dead. It shouldn't surprise you.'

Fine, she thinks, he can claim to not know about Michael being alive, but it shouldn't surprise him that Michael's alive. She knows that it didn't surprise her that Michael is alive after being thought of as dead. Her mindset at seeing him had been; with Scofield, _anything is possible_.

She hears Alex take in a measured breath on the other end, right before he asks, ' _How_ isn't he dead?'

'Not important!' she quickly dismisses. 'What's important, is that he's currently in a hospital, at his wife's beside, and he apparently hasn't moved from there in seven days.'

And thus, her rising fear.

When Penny sent her to the with a large bouquet of flowers to deliver to a patient in the hospital, she didn't think that she would find Michael Scofield, sitting in the very room that she was directed to, apparently waiting for his wife to wake up. The fact that she did, had her leaving the bouquet at reception and hurrying back home, only to be assaulted by fear once she closed the door behind her.

'Please tell me you're not talking about Sara, Gretchen,' Alex plainly says, as though to communicate that she shouldn't miss a syllable of what he said.

'Of course,' she involuntarily bursts out. 'I think that idiot woman shot Sara!'

She has no proof at this point, after all, Penny only gave her limited information, but she's pretty sure that Penny had a hand in shooting Sara. It may not have been Penny who pulled the trigger, but the difference will be the same, because the outcome remains the same anyway; that Sara was shot, and has since been unconscious.

'Oh…' Alex sounds out his surprise. 'Oh…' he sounds out his disbelief, and then, 'Oho-ho-ho…'

Now, he just sounds more than interested in what she has to say. If she's interpreting it correctly, he sounds like he's imagining the worst for the idiot woman who decided that it was a good idea to shoot Sara, while also sounding like he's giving a very clear warning to the wrong person.

'She didn't,' he challenges with a nervous laugh in his voice, probably for proper confirmation that Sara was shot.

He's not helping her fear at all, she realises. His somewhat subtle warnings, aren't helping her fear at all. If this was something that she thought she could handle on her own, she wouldn't have called him in the first place, he has to know that.

'I've had too much experience with Scofield to be making this up.'

And hence, her rising fear. She just came from prison for the love of something, she doesn't want to get back into the cycle of feeling locked up. One thing is for sure if Michael decides to make a move, and that is how her life would've been much easier in prison. Like she thought before, her fear isn't the ordinary kind of paralysing fear, it's the kind only inspired by knowledge of what Michael is capable of doing in vengeance for the people that he loves, more specifically Sara.

'Sara better not die,' Alex warns her seriously.

Irritated as much as she is feeling falsely accused, she cries, 'You're telling me, genius! I'm the one who was brought into this blindly. I had nothing to do with it, but do you think Michael's going to let me go? I'm automatically guilty by association.'

'Then get out,' Alex calmly advises. 'Expose her before he finds her.'

That's his big idea? Pfft!

'Expose the woman who magically forged my exoneration papers?' she starts, taking on a sarcastic tone to complete the rest of what she has to say. 'Yeah, sure, Alex, why don't I just donate my heart to you while I'm at it, because that's not a deadly idea either!'

From his end, she hears a small click of the tongue, followed by, 'Then don't call me again. I'm offering you a solution, not trying to destroy you.'

'Ha,' she mocks, 'offer yourself a solution, Alex, because guess what, you're guilty by association too. Think, Alex, this is Sara we're talking about. The woman probably doesn't even know it, but we all know that she's that untouchable nuclear weapon, that causes more than ripples for effects in your life. You should know that. You know as well as I do, that from the officer who opened the cell door for my release, to the very idiot who shot Sara, he's going to come for all of us.'

And that, that is the very reason that she feels this way, damn it!

'Oh,' someone behind her drawls, 'you exaggerate.'

It's not Alex, that she knows, because her phone is still pressed to her ear, and no response came from the other end. That voice, only belongs to one person, and that person, is most likely Sara's shooter. Directly or indirectly, Sara's shooter just entered into their shared apartment, without Gretchen paying enough attention to hear the door open and close.

'Alex,' she says into the phone as she turns around to face Sara's shooter, 'I'll call you back,' and then she cuts the call off.

'You,' Gretchen lets out coldly.

The other woman firstly smiles warmly at her, as if there's nothing wrong in the world, and then only softly says, 'Gretch.'

'You're stupid, Penny,' she spits at the woman.

Okay, she'll admit, that like Penny just announced, she's exaggerating it a little more than she should, but who knows, maybe after seven years, Michael really has gotten to that point in his life, where he'll do something like that. For all she knows, he's gotten to a point where he keeps Sara in his pocket, for the fear that someone will take her away from him, and thus easily pushed passed his limits if he was ever tested. It could be both, she might be reaching with her exaggeration, or she could be onto something. The one thing that she does know, is that Sara is the last person who can be _shot_ in Michael's circle of people.

'I'm stupid how?' Penny asks her.

For a moment before she answers, Gretchen can only look at the woman before her and wonder... Here's this woman, a beautiful black woman with velvety-deeply rich brown of her skin tone, neatly styled dreadlocks, and what seems like a sane head on her shoulders, and yet... She doesn't seem like the stupid type, the reckless type, the careless type and yet...

'What the _hell_ were you thinking shooting Sara?' she screams at Penny. 'That's how stupid you are.'

While it's true that this Penny woman faked her exoneration papers, and offered her a place to stay, one thing needs to be clear between them; that is, that she, Gretchen Morgan, is not afraid of _her_. Even if Penny was a giant man, black or white, bulky and influential, she still wouldn't be afraid of Penny. What she fears, is Michael, because he has the mental vindictiveness, to mess up her life _colossally_. Fresh out of prison, that's the last thing that she needs.

'Gretch, look,' Penny starts, 'I told you when I brought you here, that there's a guy who's won all of his fights in his life, and I simply want to play with him.'

Yeah, no, Penny told her that part, and she accepted that, but she hadn't given any names at the time. Had she known that Penny meant to give her a part in her so-called game with none other than Michael Scofield, she wouldn't have accepted the proposal. She suddenly feels infuriated, and because she does, she moves quickly to forcefully shove Penny against the door, pinning her there with her body. What's more infuriating, is how nonchalant she's being about this.

'You play, by throwing yo-yos at him!' she aggressively says. 'You play, by sending him puzzles! You don't freaking play by _shooting his wife in the back_!'

Just the simple thought of the ramifications of that stupid act, are enough to drive her insane with fear, if she allows it. How could one person be so stupid. Just how is it possible?

As though it means nothing to Penny to be in this position, and much still be talked to like that, she gently pushes Gretchen away from. Clearly, Gretchen thinks to herself as she moves away, Penny doesn't understanding the urgency here.

'You're worried for nothing,' Penny simply says. 'A lot of men lose their wives, it's human nature. They live afterwards, and anyway, listen, I'm busy working on Theodore Bagwell's papers too, so don't worry.'

Freaking T-Bag? She's got to be kidding! She can't seriously be betting her safety on _that guy_. And what's with that nonsense of other men losing wives all the time and still living? Obviously, this woman has never met the special case that Michael is.

'You think he'll keep Michael off your back?' Gretchen honestly wants to know.

Again, Penny doesn't seem to realise just what this all means, because she gently sighs to say, 'Gretch, the whole point of my game, is to prove to myself that Michael Scofield, is _not_ all that. I don't want to rule the world. I don't want him to help me smuggle in tons of illegal goods. Neither do I want to infest the world with criminals. I simply want to prove to myself that Michael isn't all that, and I just happen to need a team for that. And who better than people who aren't exactly Michael's fans?'

'You're stupid,' Gretchen snaps as a response.

She's tempted to shove the woman against the door again, but she doesn't feel like it's worth it. If this woman isn't going to acknowledge her stupidity and accept that she is the biggest of fools, she's not going to waste her breath. Or energy for that matter.

'I'm bored,' Penny says, somewhat heartily, 'that's what.'

Gretchen wonders, since when is there a separation between boredom and stupidity?

'You'll have it far worse once he finds you,' she tells Penny. 'Because you shot Sara, he'll come looking for you anyway. But you better hope and pray that she's not pregnant or ends up paralysed, because then, honey…'

'Relax, Gretch,' Penny rolls her eyes, 'I shot Sara in an open crowd, behind several people, in a place with no cameras. I even stood and waited for him to look around and see where the shot had come from, but all he did was catch her fall, and say something to her. Even as he called for an ambulance, his eyes were only on her. Plus, I've been told that he hasn't left the hospital since he got there. It's only the doctor who felt pity for him, and brought him a change of clothes from the bloody mess his are. There's no way he'll find me.'

Stunned at the confession and sheer stupidity at thinking that Michael will let that limit him, Gretchen smiles condescendingly. The fool! It's worryingly sad how she believes her own words, when she just admitted to freaking shooting Sara. Penny's a stupid fool, who's going to drag her down a path that she doesn't want to be on. Maybe Alex was onto something, she should expose Penny to Michael; after all, her allegiance is to herself, not this Penny woman, even though she's responsible for her release.

'He will find you, trust me, honey,' Gretchen starts to assure her, 'and when he does-'

'That's _if_ he does,' Penny interrupts her, 'which he won't, because he has no clue to go by.'

That's her security blanket, that he has no clue to go by? The fool.

'He will find you,' Gretchen says again, ignoring Penny's confidence, 'and trust me, honey, and when he does, he will make you combust.'

Actually, if Penny were to literally combust, that would be a better ending for her, compared to the mess Michael could land her in, that will forever scar her life. They are talking about a man who took down The Company here, an organisation with countless operatives all over the world. What's to stop him from taking on a singular woman with no team?

'He won't find me,' Penny calmly assures her, 'not _until_ I want him to find me. And that's when you and this T-Bag come in. It'll be a fun game of Tag, because he'll be _it_ all the time.'

That's it! This is where she'll draw the line. She has got to get herself separated from this Penny woman. What's surprising, is that Penny is a perfectly sane woman, but she apparently _just_ doesn't have common sense. If she's researched Michael, she should've found out that common sense when dealing with Michael, _equals to leaving Sara the hell alone_.

'You're messing with the wrong guy, Penny, honey,' she warns the other woman while there is still time to back off, 'and just so you know, I'm not getting involved in this. I'd rather go back to prison again.'

Being out of prison, she has plans to start over in a way. She really, really doesn't want to fall back in the line of doing things that could get arrested and sentenced again. She's not claiming to be a girl scout or anything like that, but the bottom line is that she would rather not find herself in prison again.

'Don't be silly, Gretch,' Penny laughs off her prison comment, 'after faking your papers, getting you back into prison will be suspicious. If you don't want to be a part of this, fine. Go.'

Both of Gretchen's eyebrows raise at that. 'Just like that?'

'I obviously have to write you a new part in my play,' Penny sighs theatrically like she's really not looking forward to this, 'but yeah, you can leave.'

'I will,' Gretchen answers clearly.

'Just don't come back, please.'

Oh, she wouldn't dream of it. She loves the idea of being free too much, to stay in a state of Michael Scofield-fear. That life is no longer for her, but before she leaves for good, she'll offer Penny one last piece of advice.

'Just know,' she whispers carefully, 'that your little play, whatever game this is, it's going to end badly for you. Remember those words.'

'I'm the author here,' Penny waves her hand to disregard the warning. 'I write the scripts, and I create the games. Now get out.'

* * *

Chapter 2, **Bringing Me Down.**


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2, **Bringing Me Down.**

* * *

In her old line of work, Gretchen _knew_ that every deed that she did to get the job done, would be a dirty one. It was always the unwritten print, that even if the deed was not immediately dirty, it was still a dirty act. In essence, she knew that that there was never such a thing as a 'clean and right job' with The Company. She'd learned, in that line of work, that there was no use having feelings and paying attention to them, because the dirty cycle would just be repeated even two seconds after the previous dirty deed.

In that way, going by that logic of life, she'd trained herself not care for her life in _great_ measure, because she wouldn't know when it was exactly that she would lose it. But after prison, after living a controlled life and having limited options, she just wants a change. She'll admit that she's had worse prisons than Miami Dade, but after seven years of control showers, controlled food, no visits from anyone, and nothing remotely close to entertaining while inside, she wants a change. There's something about being limited, being locked up, that's triggered her to want freedom.

And man, does she _want_ freedom.

She wants to do boring mundane things, like open the mail and receive advertising catalogues, just so she could sneer at them, and throw them in the rubbish bin. She wants to come home and watch boring TV, without wondering how best to come up with a strategy to execute the next plan that needs to be handled. She wants to not wonder which unpleasant place she has to travel to, which stupid people she has to interact with, for her next assignment.

That's the kind of freedom that she wants.

The freedom where she doesn't follow instructions, where she doesn't report to anyone, where the only person that she has to answer to for her failures, is herself. The freedom to make her own choices, to deal with the people that she chooses, where she gets to make personal or non-personal contact with someone, but on her own terms. She wants the kind of freedom where she decides if she wants to make enemies or not. Which is why she's here right now.

With a big bouquet of flowers in her hands, and what she hopes is a remorseful expression on her face, she crosses the space between where she is standing, and the inside of the hospital room, to stand precisely in the doorway, which is just enough to make her visible to the people in the room.

Truth be told, she doesn't really mean to have the flowers in her hand; not from the bottom of her heat anyway. She's never been the overly sentimental type, who believes in the healing powers of flowers at the bedside table of someone, but she figures that it's at least common courtesy to bring a gift along, for someone lying in a hospital bed. Plus, the flowers are the small thanks that she can give to Sara for Emily's necklace. Although she never did the confirmation if Emily received the necklace or not, she's never doubted that Sara would keep her word.

When she sees that her presence in the doorway isn't acknowledged, she steps into the room, hoping to bait Michael into seeing her.

Still, even having stepped into the room, no movement comes from Michael in his chair. Where she expected his observant and aware nature to alert him of her presence in the doorway, which would in turn make him shoot up his head to look at her, he doesn't. She almost thinks it strange of him to not do that, but when she remembers that he's here for Sara, who still hasn't gained consciousness, she's able to accept that his priorities are set right now. And so, she announces herself.

'Hi, Michael.'

She made sure to sound steady and firmly enough, for her voice to reach him all the way over where he is, but apparently, he doesn't hear her, because he still doesn't look up at her. If he gives any indication at all that he's aware of her being in the room with them, it's non-existent to her senses. She notes that as he was, his attention remains fixed on Sara's sleeping form, with his hands clasped together in front of him as he leans towards the bed. Even with the announcement of her presence, she doesn't catch a difference in that stance of his.

'Michael,' she repeats a little louder than before.

Maybe, she didn't project her voice as much as she thought she did. Maybe, her words never reached his Sara-concerned thoughts. But even with this louder call, he still doesn't make a move to acknowledge her.

And that's when she remembers…

This is Michael Scofield. She may not know much about him, but she's had pretty accurate dealings with him, that left their impressions. It's how she knows that there's no way that Michael isn't aware of her being here. There's just no way, she's sure of that.

'I'm not here for a social call,' she says, deciding to let him know that she's onto him, 'so I'm really not offended by your lack of interest. But perhaps…'

She trails off right then, to allow him the time to realise that she is out here and _wants_ his interest. Whether or not he thinks that she important to pay any mind to, she wants him to know that she's not here for his exclusive attention, for her social benefit. Even so, he still doesn't look at her, which starts to work on her patience with this whole thing. She's the one doing him a favour by being here, after all.

'Look, Michael,' she starts for his attention again, 'I'm here to give you some information. And the flowers are for Sara, by the way.'

Still, to her words, to her voice, he doesn't give her a reply.

It's fitting of him that way, she thinks, because she likes to believe that of the two of the Scofields, of Michael and Sara, Sara is the more vindictive. At least physically. Had Sara been the one in the chair, watching over a shot Michael, she's pretty sure that she would've been thrown out of the room, with the promise that she would pay once Michael had recovered.

Michael on the other hand…

She's always believed that Michael's vindictiveness, is something that he carefully guards in his mind, so that no one can break it out of him, which makes it all the harder to know what he's thinking. And that is a scary thing to think about, especially considering how gifted at using his brain he is.

But no, fear be still for a while, she says to herself. She didn't come here to be afraid of what Michael may be privately thinking. She came here to absolve herself of something that she had nothing to do with in the first place, and that's just what she'll do.

Pulling a long steadying breath, Gretchen starts to walk into the room, measuring her steps so that if he happens to look up at her, she'd be steady enough to stand without losing her balance. Step after step, she makes into the room, and once she reaches the bed, she chooses to stay on the other side of the bed, to speak from there. At this point, she's not even thinking of getting visual attention from Michael, so she doesn't hold her breath, to afford him the time to look at her. Instead, she breathes in once, pushes it out of her lungs, and then opens her mouth to start speaking.

'Nine days ago, a guard escorted me to the Warden's office, where I got my exoneration papers,' leaves her mouth steadily. 'I was told that I was being released, and I find Alexander Mahone waiting for me outside the prison. He had a plane ticket, keys and the address to an apartment, waiting for me. Both the ticket and apartment were to and in Chicago, and that's how I got here.'

No, she didn't ask questions, because she didn't want to know at the time. She'd just been fresh from prison, and she thought that when the time was right, she'd get to the bottom of what and who got her out of prison. It may not seem like a likely story, for her to just be complacent to accept 'free' charity like that, but hey, after years in prison, whatever freedom came her way, she was ready to take it.

'Here in Chicago,' she continues when no response comes from Michael, 'I found a woman named Penny in the apartment. That's all I know about her name, and we've been living together since. Yesterday, she asked me to come to this hospital and check on someone who was shot, and here I found you. I wasn't sure if she was the one who shot Sara, but she didn't deny it, so I know she did.'

There, she got it all out, she mentally breathes out. She's confessed her part of the story, her non-existent role in the shooting of his wife, and all that's left, is to wait for him to give her something. Anything that she can take with her when she leaves this hospital room.

He doesn't give her something, though. She'd think that mentioning Sara's shooting would spark some type of response in him, a flinch, a wince, anything that speaks more than his closed mouth will ever admit, but no, he gives her absolutely nothing. Because of that, she picks up her confession again.

'Penny got me out of jail, but I had nothing to do with Sara's shooting,' she explains just to leave it perfectly clear to him. 'I just came from prison Michael, I have no intention of going back, so if you think that I had a hand in Sara's shooting, I'm here to tell you that I didn't. I came to you, so let that be something of value to you. Whatever Penny did for me, I wasn't the one who asked her to, and I certainly wasn't working with her when she decided to shoot Sara.'

Still, even at this point, frustratingly so, Michael doesn't give her any type of recognition. If she didn't know that it was him and no one else sitting in that chair, staring at his wife, she would've believed that he is a statue, glued in place to act as Michael Scofield. The lack of movement coming from him, is almost unreal, especially when she'd dished out seven years worth of information.

More than slightly frustrated by his lack of attitude, she decides to give him one last chance to acknowledge her.

'Look, Michael,' she sighs, 'I have a daughter. She's almost sixteen now, and I just want to be a part of her life, if she lets me. All that Company and hitter stuff, I'm putting it behind me, so please leave me out of whatever is going on between you and Penny. I don't want any of you bringing me down. Not this time.'

Not even a split second after getting the last word out, she hears Michael pull in a sudden breath. Wow, she thinks, an actual reaction from him this time. She wonders, is that to say that he will not leave her out of this, or to say that he's had enough of her talking?

'Finally, something from you,' she voices, partly relieved, partly curious as to what he'll do next.

She doesn't have to wait long to find out what he'll do next, because after her words, he gets up from his seat, unclasps his hands as he does so, all the while not turning his face away from Sara. She partly expects him to say something along the lines of, 'Leave now,' because she interprets his action as that of someone who has had enough of her talking, only, he doesn't speak. What he does do, is keep his eyes on Sara while he begins to walk around the bed, to her side. When he reaches her, only then does he move his head away from Sara, to look her in the eyes.

It's strange, she thinks as their eyes meet, he has the most serene look on his face; so calm and undisturbed. Hopeful, even. She can't really say, but that look on his face… It's like he didn't even hear what she said, like it meant nothing to him… But then again, this is Michael and like she thought before, his vindictiveness is mentally guarded, which makes it harder to know what's going on through his mind.

'I didn't do this to Sara,' she carefully reminds him one last time. She wants it absolutely clear that she's free of all of this. 'Remember that, Michael.'

As a primary response to her declaration, Michael lifts his left hand, uses to push her hands with the flowers against her chest, keeping it there to hold her hands and flowers in place right on her chest between her breasts. Just as she's starting to question what in the world he thinks he's doing, he starts to apply pressure on her, forcing her to start moving backwards.

Because she's a little stunned, she lets him do that, she lets him force her out of the room backwards. She might as well let him, she tells herself, her eyes never leaving his. She said what she came here to say, and her part in all of this is over. Fighting him, or trying to get an explanation from him, might just agitate him to something violent.

When they get to the door, he closes his eyes briefly, and she takes that as a sign that he will say something controlled, yet threatening at the same time. Only, he simply opens his eyes, pulls in a long breath and then gives her one last push out of the door. He leaves at that, evidently deeming that as all the communication he needs to send to her, because he rotates on the spot to give her his back.

She's pretty sure it does, but she wonders, does that mean that he never wants to see her again?

* * *

Chapter 3, **Comatose.**


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3, **Comatose.**

* * *

Being who he is, he immediately knows that there's a presence at the door, even before he hears the word, 'Dad,' reach his ears.

Not so much that there's someone at the door, but that, in part, makes him frown. He wouldn't say that it's the first time since being here, that he's frowning, and yet, he can't say that it's not either. The only other time that he came close to frowning, was when a doctor ordered him to go home, and get some rest. That near frown, had been for a different emotion, one almost disconnected and unlike this new, second frown.

This frown, isn't because he feels burdened to have yet another person in this room, for his wife, no. He's frowning, because his brother _should've_ known better than to bring Mike here. He specifically didn't want his son to see his mom this way. When he remembers how when he was a child, and his mom was in the hospital, it scared him to go near the place, because he felt and thought that if he went in there, he might very well not be able to come out. It was a childish fear that he never told anyone, but he'll never forget that he felt it. For that reason, he partly didn't want Mike to be here, in case he has that same fear, or something similar to it.

All right, he'll admit that Mike might be used to hospitals, since his mom works in one, but he doesn't want his son to see his mom like this. That's the main reason for him trusting his son over to his brother care these last few days. In his head, he has it mapped out that it will break Mike to see his mom like this. If he considers and he has- how it's breaking _him_ , the older of the two, like this, he can only imagine what it would be like for his innocent son.

Nonetheless, disregarding all this, he looks up, and tries his hardest to smile at his son in response to being called. He tells his mind to tell his face to move, to smile, but he doesn't know if it actually happens, because Mike doesn't acknowledge his smile at all. Or maybe he does, he just knows better, to see through its properties as a mask.

'Hey,' he whispers to his son all the way across the room at the door.

For an immediate response, Mike just stares at him, as though looking for a way to process everything that he should, and still manage to keep all of it in, until he has to expose a little bit of it. It's his brother, whose hand is on Mike's shoulder, who speaks.

'Hey man,' he starts in a tone that speaks of his slight nervousness, 'uh...'

There's an apology coming.

Right away, from the hesitative tone, Michael just knows that his brother is going to offer him an apology for bringing Mike here, when he wasn't supposed to. That apology that he senses is going to make itself out of his brother's mouth, makes him want to deepen his frown, because it confirms that Lincoln knew better, but he still chose to do it anyway. However, as much as he wants to aggress, he considers that Mike is right there with Lincoln, and no, he shouldn't be made to witness something like that. At a time like this, specifically.

'Linc,' he softly stops his brother, 'it's fine.'

It's really not fine, because his should know better, and apparently, he did, but he just made the choice to ignore that knowledge. But for the benefit of the purpose that he has going on right here in this room, and now, his present son, he'll say the words; whether he means them or not.

His brother on the other hand, seems to detect that he's not behind his words at all, but he tries to insist on giving him an apology.

'Look man, I just-'

'Linc!' he says as sharply as he can without raising his voice.

Although he doesn't raise his voice, he shifts his eyes away from his son, to the taller man beside him. Fine, he says to himself, his brother clearly doesn't believe that he doesn't need to apologise, but he needs to believe that he should stop pushing it.

'It's fine,' Michael repeats to his brother, staring at him intently to get his silent message across.

To his fractional relief, this time, his brother nods in what looks like a reluctant way, and he quickly uses that nod as a pass to move away from that subject. Dwelling on it longer than he should, will only serve to make him frown more, and deeper, until his entire purpose for being here, is tainted horribly. Which is why, he returns his focus to his son, and calls for him to come inside the room.

'Mike.'

He doesn't necessarily need to use more words to communicate to Mike, to come to him, and he's thankful for how Mike knows that, because he begins to walk inside the room, until Mike comes to stand next to him.

'Did Mommy wake up?' he asks without wasting time.

Mike's asking him, but his eyes are solely set on Sara on the small hospital bed. Because of this, Michael takes the slight moment to study his son, and evaluate him that way.

He watches as Mike's eyes narrow just a little bit. He notices as, only for a brief second, a frown follows that. And then, he observes how after all that, Mike does this thing with his mouth, where he's trying not to pull his mouth together into a circle form, but he doesn't manage it quite as well, to keep it undetected.

He's in pain, Michael decides without a doubt.

There's so much pain that Mike's not showing, but it's there, under all the physical expressions that he's trying to keep from surfacing. Michael knows this, because he is doing the same thing.

It's the strangest, most painful thing, actually, to look at his son and want him to freely feel and express it accordingly, when he can't do the same, but at the same time, feeling grateful that he doesn't have to witness his son's pain expressed. It makes it feel like he wants two different things for his son concurrently. Where on the one hand, he wants his son to express his pain for not having his mom, because then, he'll be able to comfort his son, but on the other hand…

'Not yet, Mike,' he finally answers his son.

Mike looks at him then, and it's all over his face, his plea to be told that his mom will awaken soon, and he can talk to her again. And there, Michael decides, that's why he's partly glad that Mike isn't expressing his pain openly. How would he even handle it in excess? He doesn't know how best to deal with pleas that he can't have a solid plan around.

'Soon,' he adds to answer the plea.

As uncertain as he is about when she'll stop being in a coma like this, he believes that she'll wake up soon. That's all that he's setting his mind on right now, and so for him, it's a truth that he can't afford to doubt. He can't afford to doubt, or to get angry, to feel sad, to entertain apologies ,or anything other than hope, because energy directed elsewhere, is energy that he actively sucks and kills from his hope that soon, his wife will rise from her comatose state, and smile at him again.

'Dad?' Mike calls after the small silence. 'What really happened to Mom?'

As though someone gave him a little slap across the face, he feels that question hit him. However, unlike the effect of a little slap across the face, he abruptly pulls in a breath that signifies the feeling of something colossal.

And it is.

The entire memory of what happened to Sara, and how he has no idea how it happened, is too enormous to him. And then, factoring that he knew that he would get that question, sooner or later, and how he knew that when he got it, he wouldn't be ready to tell his son the bad truth, the effect of the question is colossal enough, to bring out such a silent panic from him.

'Mike…' he softly starts, but has no intention of finishing.

When he doesn't continue, when nothing more leaves his mouth, Mike's expression changes to that of hurt comprehension. If Michael hadn't seen him use it before, he wouldn't know how to identify it, because it primarily presents as a wounded expression. It's mostly Mike's eyes that give him away, more than the words that leave his mouth do.

'You're not going to tell me, are you, Dad?'

That look on his son's face... The way his eyes are concentrated at him, says that he knows enough to determine his own conclusions. Near accurate conclusions, at that.

'Mike…' he starts, and this time, he can't think of more to say.

What he really want, is to find the right words to kill this topic off completely, but on the other hand, Mike has the right to know _something_ , at least. Sara has been in his life since, and that counts for a lot. That's not even to mention that he's affected by his mother's absence, so yes, he needs to be told something. Maybe not everything in detail, but something all the same.

'Uncle Lincoln won't tell me,' Mike lets him know, his innocent defeated face telling a part of the story within him. 'And I know that Mom wouldn't tell me if it was about you either. But I just want to know why she won't wake up, Dad.'

'Someone hurt her,' he decides to say.

He didn't waste a breath in giving an immediate reply, because he'd already made up his mind to give his son something to know. At least this way, Mike will know that something is not right for a reason that exists, rather than a reason that he doesn't know about.

'Who hurt her?'

This time, with the answer to this question, he lets a beat pass by, just so that he can compose himself with a small breath.

'I don't know,' he breathes, looking his son right in the eyes.

Technically, he considers his answer to be the truth. Yes, Gretchen came here, and yes, he heard everything that she said to him, and of course, he filed it away in a corner he has no desire to light at all just yet, but he really doesn't know _who_ hurt his wife.

The police asked him the same thing, when they wanted to carry out their investigation, until he told them to leave him alone. The doctor asked him that same question, after he had treated her. Even Heather, Sara's best friend, asked him that question, when she called all the way from Ithica for a friendly chat. And to every one of those parties, he gave the same exact answer as he just gave his son. He only wishes that no one else asks him that question, when he doesn't have the answer to meet it with.

'Will you find them like you found them last time?' Mike wants to know, apparently feeling unsatisfied with his answer.

 _Will_ he find them? Wondering about precisely that, he looks at his son. He's not so much weighing whether he will or not, he's simply wondering if he will find the person who did this to Sara. Silently, he brings to his mind that he hasn't at all thought of doing something like that, not even during and after Gretchen's visit. He really hasn't given it a thought, whether he would find Sara's shooter or not, and now his son brought it up, and he finds himself wondering about it.

'Of course, he will, Mike,' his brother answers for him for some reason. 'Your Dad won't let people hurt your Mom without doing anything about it.'

Too fast, because it gives his emotions away, he shoots his brother a look of panic. He wants to hold his tongue, and leave at just a stare of warning, but he hears his brother's name come out of his mouth.

'Linc.'

His brother has no idea what he's talking about him. And even if he did, it's not his place to say things like that to Mike.

'What?' his brother pulls an unfazed face. 'You _are_ going to get them, aren't you?'

As much as it sounds like a question, they both know that his brother isn't giving him a choice in the matter, by questioning him. That sentence in a form of a question that came from his brother, is really a solid reminder that his brother trusts him to be himself, and thus, fight tooth and nail to avenge his Sara.

Well, if that's what Linc believes…

'Hey, Mike,' he decides to turn his eyes back to his son. 'I'm going to talk to your uncle outside for a little bit, okay? Do you want to sit in my chair, and watch over your mom for me?'

From the way that Mike hesitates to answer right away, Michael's almost too sure that he wants to answer negatively. Maybe, his son can see that not everything is as it seems. Or maybe, he just wants to hear it come from his dad, that his dad will find the people who hurt his mom, like he found Jacob the last time. If it's the latter that Mike expects…

'Mike, please,' he begs in a whisper.

It's the only way that he can think of to get his son to agree to staying here while he goes outside to talk to Linc. He doesn't want to give false promises that he might not fulfill. Not to his son.

Fortunately, Mike chooses to indulge him and nods for him to leave. Partly scared that Mike might change his mind, he gets up out of his chair and moves away, to make room for Mike to occupy it. Only once he's satisfied with Mike seated in his chair, keeping his eyes fixed on Sara, does he move to walk past Lincoln and then out of the room.

'Michael,' his brother begins when he joins him just outside the door.

'Why'd you bring him, Linc?' he demands roughly.

The roughness of his words, doesn't tamper with the whispery tone of his voice, but he's sure that his brother gets the message enough to know that they will not be having a friendly chat out here. It's just as well that the corridor is empty, because he wouldn't like to be making a quiet scene, observed by a quiet audience.

'What was I supposed to do, Michael?' Linc roughly whispers, as if to attack him back. 'He stopped eating yesterday, man. I can't let your son starve, so I promised to let him see Sara today.'

Fine, Linc couldn't have let Mike starve, and obviously if it got to the point of him refusing to eat, it got serious, but still…

'He shouldn't be here,' he tells his older brother in a less rough deliverance. 'He shouldn't see her like that.'

An apologetic look crosses his brother's face, almost as if to say that he's sorry that he'd been rough with him. He appreciates that reaction, but unfortunately, it doesn't right the wrong, neither does it heal the harm of bringing mike here.

'I get that, Michael,' Linc replies, 'but what am I supposed to tell Sara when she wakes up? I let your son starve, because he wanted to see you, and I wouldn't bring him?'

Of course not, he counters mentally, but to his brother he maintains his first verbal argument.

'I specifically didn't want him to be here, Linc,' he stresses with more emphasis. 'And now he thinks that I'll get justice for Sara.'

That's the worst of everything, because not only does that put him in a place where he has to shoulder the innocent hope of his son, it also means discolouring his clear mission here in the hospital, right next to Sara. He doesn't need any of that 'justice for Sara' pressure upon him, since it may very well interfere with what he has his mind set on here.

'Because you're going to do it,' Linc continues to insist. 'Michael, this is your wife, man. You can't let this go!'

Even if he'd said that without shaking his head to disagree with him, his determined expression, would've been enough for Michael to know the truth; his brother is not playing about this. He is completely serious, and he won't accept for anything less from his brother.

For a moment, he can only look at his brother. No actual thought goes through his brain as to what to say to his brother, though. To him, simply looking at his brother, is enough to get him through the moment of feeling like he has to defend himself.

'Just look at you,' his brother inclines his head towards him. 'Michael, this isn't you. You're acting like you don't care to do anything for Sara's justice, and that's not you.'

Again, he can only look at his brother, to weather the course of this conversation. He doesn't particularly feel the desire within him, to spare thoughts towards this particular topic.

'Say something, Michael!' Linc finally seems to snap.

He's not the only one, though. Michael decides right there and then that he too, has had enough of this.

'Linc, stop!' he rasps, his breathing starting to change its natural rhythm.

He notices this about himself, about his breathing, and about the way he broke apart just briefly, and he can't help it think that _this_ is exactly _why_ he didn't want anyone here at the hospital with him. he knew that no one would understand him, and that he wouldn't want to find the energy and patience to defend himself to anyone.

Shaking his head in disappointment, his brother asks, 'What happened to you? You're really just giving up?'

Giving up? No, he's not giving up. He's doing the exact opposite, and all the external factors and reactions that third parties bring into his life as of the day that Sara got shot, _shouldn't_ be a part of it at all. _Not_ of what he has going on here in favour of Sara.

'No, Linc,' he steps closer to his brother to leave this absolutely clear, 'I'm not giving up. I'm keeping _all_ of my focus positive and hopeful, because that's _all_ I can give Sara right now. I'm not going to contaminate my hope with thoughts of the person who did this to her. Not while she's lying there like that.'

'Oh?' his brother lifts an eyebrow very sceptically. 'Remember Michael, the more days that pass, the easier it is for whoever it was, to get away from you.'

What, is Linc not listening to him? Did he just explain himself to not be understood?

'I don't care about that right now, Linc!' he cries. 'I'm just focused on hoping and having faith that she'll come out of this coma. I just…'

As he pauses, he softly closes his eyes and shakes his head, in an attempt to block out the image and still shake it out of his mind, so that it doesn't affect him as much as he knows it will.

'Sometime after we thought we were done with the whole Scylla thing,' he says through closed eyes, 'Sara said something to me…'

 _I know I'm supposed to be happy right now, but I'm so scared_ , she'd said to him with an uncomfortably nervous laugh in her tone. _Just scared that we're gonna have come all this way, and I'm gonna lose you anyway_ , she'd finished her confession, which led him to wordlessly pull her into him.

'At the time,' he picks up, choosing to open his eyes then, 'I could only empathise with her, but right now, how she felt is how I'm living. I don't expect you to understand how that's like, but I _can't_ feel, think, breathe, or do anything other than have hope and faith for her to open her eyes, and come back to me.'

He didn't, he didn't, he really, really didn't go through seven years of being without her, just to get her back again, and then lose her, because he gets involved in some new vendetta, or conspiracy involving her directly, or indirectly. Seven years away from her, have only strengthened his need to be with her, once he found again. Those same seven years, have also taught him, that getting into something, whatever it is, could easily just be an indefinite separation from the people that he loves; specifically his wife. And no, no, no, he just can't!

Damn it, he doesn't want to step foot into that world, where it would be so easy to fall into his old and familiar habits of escapes, traps and threats, just to lose the love of his life all over again! Damn it, no! Just the thought makes him want to explode, and exploding is exactly what dirtifies his hope and faith, making it not as pure as it needs to be.

'I can't lose Sara, Linc,' he pleads weakly, as though his brother has that power to prevent that. 'I just can't. Without Sara, I have nothing.'

A lifetime again, he breathed Sara into his lungs and she pasted herself onto every single fibre of his lungs, never be removed again. And that's just how it is for him; without Sara on his lungs, he has nothing.

Placing a comforting, somewhat understanding hand on Michael's shoulder, his brother accepts that by saying, 'I know.'

That means something to Michael, it really does. It may not be much, but having his brother a little closer to the same page as him, is comforting enough, to wash away all the reactive emotions that he's been hit with since his brother showed up.

'Then just let me be,' he begs softly. 'Please. I know you mean well, but just… Don't, please.'

Apparently, unable to say the words aloud, his brother nods somberly. His brother does that, he nods, implying that he understands, however, Michael knows that his brother doesn't really understand.

Linc may understand that he can't lose Sara, but that's as far as his understanding goes. The more important part, the depth of that inability of his to lose Sara, is the part that Michael knows doesn't register in his brother's brain. He can't blame his brother for not understanding that, though.

Linc didn't ever experience so much with a woman that he loved, concerning the woman that he loved, and then went to be ripped away from her, for more than half a decade, so he wouldn't understand that depth. Linc has no experience of what it's like to go through seven years without the only woman that he's ever loved, only to be tempted to get back into that life of… Of so much… Of the disturbing and reluctant addiction of getting into something like that…

No. He can't.

'Linc, I'm going back inside.'

Once again, his brother nods to say that he accepts that, but he also asks, 'Do you want me to take Mike?'

'Maybe tomorrow,' Michael shakes his head to decline the offer.

True, it would be easier to not have Mike around, what with his feelings and all, but it's not fair on the little guy to be excluded like this. He loves his mom, and it must kill him to not see her every day like he is used to doing.

'I'm here,' his brother tells him. 'Whatever you need, just let me know.'

Patting his brother appreciatively on the shoulder, he says, 'Thanks, Linc,' before he starts to walk back into Sara's room to resume his mission;

To hope for his wife's recovery, with all the purity in the world. To have faith that she'll come back to him, without the slightest drop of doubt. To optimistically be by her side, literally, until she opens her eyes.

* * *

Chapter 4, **Down To My Last.**


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4, **Down To My Last.**

* * *

Four and a half months, and thirteen hours earlier, he feels sick. Physically sick.

Despite having earlier groaned at his brother for calling her, thus sucking her into this dangerous world of escaping and running to keep alive, while lying on the makeshift bed inside the boat, he can't deny the quivering of his heart from the thought of possibly seeing her in the flesh. Right in the centre of his mind, he knows that he shouldn't dare hold on to hope that he'll actually see her, because he knows, and he knows this too well, that at the last minute, even the most excellently revised plans are vulnerable to change. Except, in the dead centre of his heart, he can't help it wonder, 'what if', and in wondering like that, he can't help it want to do the unthinkable, and put a little of his feeble strength into entertaining a positive outcome to his quiet wonder.

'Linc...' he quietly calls for his brother, pausing only to give himself enough of a second, to keep from overwhelming himself before he's even asked the question. 'How far is it to Greece?'

It's a carefully controlled question, that's designed to make anyone else believe that he's asking purely for the sake of his poisoned system, and how long he has to wait to get better, when he really wants to hear, what his brother already knows, is how long he has to endure before seeing Sara's face again. Never mind the poison roaming around his body, just waiting to kill him, because living through the eternity that's the time that he has to wait to see 'the wife that he hasn't seen in seven years,' will do its fair share of effectively killing him more than any poison ever could.

'Twelve hours,' he hears his brother answer just as carefully, going further to directly answer the question that wasn't outright asked. 'Sara's gonna be there in twelve.'

Twelve hours, he softly repeats in his head, the calculating part of his brain already beginning to do the calculations. Twelve hours. That's what it's come down to; seven long years are suddenly reduced to twelve hours. Over the years, he'd hoped that this day would come, but hours? Mere hours, not even a full day, are somewhat a laxative to his already faint system, and he realises that twelve hours sound really long and scary to him.

'If there is twelve hours in me...' he barely breathes out, just before he leans down the bed to vomit.

His sudden fear, is that he might just be cowardly and succumb to death before he sees her with his own eyes. It's no longer the wait that he has to endure in order to see her that will kill him softly, it's rather that he might just die before he sees her, and that is the most sickening thing to him.

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 **26Chapters**

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Four and a half months earlier, he feels weaker than his current poisonous sickness can _ever_ get him to be.

Although he finds out that he did have twelve hours after all, enough to be here now, that he didn't become as weak as to give in before the twelve hours were up, he realises that a much deadly weakness attacks him when Sara bends at his side, tentatively touching the side of his face. When his stomach lurches in reaction to her soft and gentle touch, he feels at his absolute weakest, that no power boost could help him in any way. He feels his face contort to something that probably makes him appear ready to cry out in painful happiness. Happiness, yes, but painful in that it hurts him to be this happy, when he feels like he has no right to be, but damn it, she's Sara, _his wife_...

'I missed you,' her breaking voice declares to him.

More than he felt before, the weakness arrests him as a result of her choice of words, that he begins to spurt out muffled crying sounds through his closed mouth. How she carefully chose not to greet him and not to welcome him back into her life, but chose to inform him that she never let go of him in her heart, is everything enough to break him. For a little bit of strength that he can maybe siphon off from her, so he can brave out this moment with her, and not miss a thing about it, he brings his free hand to clasp over her hand on his face. As he does, he hopes, _oh_ , he hopes to dear life that even for a second longer, she'll keep her hand on him like this, without minding that his hand is cold contrast to her warm one.

Before this, even after feeling her hand on his face, he hadn't dared to open his eyes to make sure that she is really here with him, but feeling her hand on his face like this, he can't keep being afraid of being met by a blurry image of the woman that he loves, so he opens his eyes to look at her. With his eyes open, he notices how it seems like she's been waiting for him to do that, because he catches her just in time to see her chin barely touch his forearms in an affectionate gesture, when she moves her hand with urgency to his head, just so her lips can kiss his forehead. At the contact of the light kiss on his forehead, he closes his eyes again, to savour the delicate and damp feel of her lips.

'I'm gonna fix you up, and then we'll talk, okay?'

There it is, the actual sound of her voice again, and he doesn't know how to stop himself from becoming weaker and weaker. Over the years, in head, he's heard her voice replayed in his weakest moments when he was in solitary, except then, her voice has always been a distant sound, one that reached him, but he could sadly never hold onto, because it was too far for him to reach with his mental hands. Only now, here voice is hear, and it's real, and he loves it, and he decides that he wants to keep hearing again, so musters all of his weakness together to nod his confirmation that he understands her. He opens his eyes again, because just then he feels himself losing her closeness when she gets off her knees or squatting position to say something else to him.

'I'm going to make you okay,' she promises.

Even if she wasn't a doctor by profession, even if she hadn't treated him for injuries so many times in the past, he would still trust her. Maybe it can be attributed to the fact that he feels too weak to think outside of Sara being here with him, for him. She doesn't need to assure him that he in good and safe hands with her, that, even at his weakest, he doesn't need to hear come from her, because he already knows it. Only when she reaches out to lift his hand and see the damage for herself, and he starts to whimper in protest, does he appreciate why she told him that assurance. Just like that time in the infirmary when his toes were cut off and she reached out to take off the sock wrapped around his foot, when he tried to stop her from looking at it, she needs him to understand that she won't hurt him more than he already is.

'Sh, sh, sh,' she lovingly shushes him. 'It's okay.'

His physical pain isn't okay, he thinks. However, he will accept her saying so, because now that she's here, it _is_ okay. She's always been his doctor, and her mere presence has always made the difference to his heart. Where his body didn't immediately know to calm down and believe that he was in good hands, his heart always knew that her presence brought with it all the remedy that was necessary to keep him calm, even if his body wouldn't believe it. That's how it always has been, and nothing about that, is different now.

'Hey, Lincoln, uh...' she says, her right hand still reassuringly pressed on him, 'could you pass me that coat rack?'

Out of the blue, he feels a little jabbing stab near his stomach that has nothing to do with his injury, and he only hope that it's not showing on him, for her to see. There's no universe in which he would ever be jealous of his brother having Sara's attention, but right here, in this moment, considering his weakness, he _does_ want to feel jealous. What he knows is that his brother already spoke to Sara on the phone, when he asked her to come here, and he obviously talked to her when she got here, so does he have to be here too? Take a portion of Sara's attention here too?

'Could I get that chair?' he hears her ask, and obviously she is not talking to him still.

He's well aware that this room, whoever it belongs to, is not a sanctuary that needs highlighted privacy solely for the two of them, but really, is it too much to ask that Sara treats him in private like she's always done? In his weakness, he wants it to be just the two of them, without his brother, where the only person that she will be able to talk to, is him.

'Uh, yeah,' Whip's voice answers, making him press his eyelids closer together.

Whip is here too? Really, who else is in this room that shouldn't be here?

Hold on, what he is doing? Who is he to be choosy, and shut out the people who care about him, all so that he can have privacy with Sara? No, he's being wildly selfish, more that he should be allowed under the circumstances. It's clear that everyone here in the room, has every interest in seeing him get better, so he can't allow his selfish desires to overrule what's morally right.

Thinking this, he decides to let what will play out, play out the way that it will, by keeping his eyes closed. For his own safety, only his ears should be attentive to what is going on, instead of seeing it with his own eyes, thus provoking unwarranted jealousy that he shouldn't be feeling entitled to.

'Thanks,' Sara says after a moment, probably having gotten everything that she asked for.

He hears more shuffling after he speaks, before she comes to quickly stick a needle in his arm. Because he didn't expect her to do that, at least, without telling him, he sharply inhales through his nose to muffle the sound of the discomfort that he feels. Against his will, uncomfortable tears push out through his closed eyes, as he just as involuntarily groans.

'We'll do a transfusion,' her soft doctor voice breaks through the shuffling that had been happening until now.

With his eyes closed, he can only wonder if she's talking to him, or maybe it's Lincoln and Whip that she's telling. Either way, he can only allow himself to remain blindly attentive, until a time when he feels that it's safe for him to open his eyes to his surroundings again.

'I'm O-Negative, that's the universal donor,' she says again. 'Turns out that's the only blood type that I could've given him...'

O-Negative... That never came up in their previous conversations. He never knew that about her. He knows a mountain of things about her personality and how she reacts in different situation, but her blood type being O-Negative, is something that he didn't know. Well, now he knows. It's not the ideal situation to learn something about her in, but at least, he's learned one more thing about his wife now.

'Maybe there's something to destiny, huh?'

Wait... Is she confessing that she came _all_ this way across the world to give him _her blood_? She came all this way, to make sure that her blood enters his veins, for him to live? He just wants to have it clear she came from as far as she did, just so that he can live _through her blood_?

He can't even...

Gosh, how did he get so...?

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 **26Chapters**

* * *

Four months, thirteen days, six hours and twenty minutes earlier, he feels utterly defeated.

A while ago, he felt weak, but now he feels defeated, and yes, there is a difference, a very big difference between feeling weak and feeling defeated. When he felt weak, he had surrendered to weakness, by accepting that he didn't have enough power to resist falling into weakness. Now that he's feeling defeated, it's more about being overpowered without the option of fighting back and overcoming defeat.

Her soft kiss on his lips is everything to defeat him, that he can't do anything at all, even if he felt like he needed to. His whole body stiffens long before his lips can remember that her lips against his, feel like this; so _loving_ in their chasteness. His senses freeze miserably just as he thinks to take it all in, and digest this moment happening between them. His senses let him down colossally, like they've never done before, that his poor heart sinks at the thought that he might not even be able to remember this moment with vividness.

He can't not remember this moment, this kiss in detail. He just can't... But... Even his will to force himself to be insistent on his senses capturing this kiss of hers in perfect detail, is so, so defeated...

If only her could blame his defeat on the fact that she is married to another man, and it would wrong of him to return her kiss, with the same chasteness. If only he could accuse her vows to another man, as the reason that he can't do anything to actively be present in the moment with her. It would be so much easier for him to accept that he can't press his lips back on hers, for the excuse of not making her that woman, the one who betrays the man that she's married to. Heaven knows that with those excuses, he'd allow himself off the hook, for feeling defeated to do something even as simple as pull in and push out breaths through his nostrils.

* * *

 **26Chapters**

* * *

Four months earlier, he feels unreal.

The maths is simple; he's here and she's here. His clothes are no longer on his body, and neither are hers, but he feels unbelievably unreal, like a non-existent fraction, or better yet, an imaginary illusion of a hypothesis.

It's the delicate precise feel of her tangible skin on his. It's the lingering whispers that her kisses leave in his ears, and everywhere that they touch. It's the gentle press of her body on his. It's her rehabilitating patience with him. It's how she's not hesitating, how she's not waiting for him to take control in being here with her in their pending union. It's how for a change, she's the one easing him into this, and asking all the questions.

'Are you okay?' she wants to know before she goes any further.

She's asking because the doctor in her knows that he's a starved man, while the woman in love with him, knows to not overwhelm him. When it comes to this, he's a man who hasn't eaten in seven years, and she can't just right away give him a full course meal at once. It would be all too easy to allow him the momentum to indulge in urgency as much as he wants to, but thankfully, she's a doctor. And her being a doctor means that like she would have to do for any starved person, gradually increasing the dosage of food as time goes on, is the best way to go about getting their system to remember what food feels like, without rejecting it.

But oh, he feels unreal still... All of it makes him feel unreal, like he isn't who he thought he was, because in this situation, he doesn't have control over anything. It's not that he minds not having control, it's just that it makes him feel unreal; a stranger of sorts to himself, because he doesn't recognise this side of himself.

'I'm going to... Touch you, okay?' she whispers, her hands carefully tracing along the inside of his naked thighs.

She's being soft enough to give his body enough time to take in the feel and produce the necessary and relevant responses. She could do this all night, her caresses tell him. For as long as he needs to gather enough feeling that will last, to get them through their union successfully, she'll refrain from actually placing any part of her onto him.

'I love you, okay?' she announces more than asks him, to assure him that he should trust her to lead the way for them.

* * *

 **26Chapters**

* * *

Nine days earlier, he feels down to his last fibre endurance.

'And there's just the bait left,' he tells her with his eyes on the shop way across the street.

That's at least where he knows the bait to be. He still isn't sure what kind of bait to get, but he's going to have to trust that the dealer will help with that, and to see what she thinks of all of this, he looks to his side. His eyes find her looking towards the same shop, only with a soft smile on her face. He likes to see that smile on her face, although it makes him curious to know what's behind the smile. He may just be forlorn, but he wants to know every little thing about her.

'I hope he'll be surprised,' he finishes to express, when he's really just hoping to engage her enough to find out why she's smiling softly.

'He will be,' she answers him, her eyes not leaving the shop. 'Really happy too.'

It's not that he expected to hear differently, even though he mentally prepared himself for to get the other answer, but her answer makes him feel all the colours of hope. She couldn't ever know how it makes him feel to know that she, the mother of the son that they are talking about, is assuring him that he has nothing to worry about.

'You think so?' he asks her despite her assurance.

It never hurts to get extra confirmation, especially when it comes to doing right by his son, who he hasn't been around for all his life.

Turning to face him, she nods to answer with, 'I mean, he's been waiting for you to remember the trip on your own, so yeah, he'll be happy.'

'He told you that?'

Like the surprised tone of his voice, he truly _is_ surprised to learn of this just now. All this time that Mike never brought up the fishing trip, he just assumed that Mike forgot, or at the very best, lost interest in it, and didn't want to say anything to disappoint his dad. It didn't occur to him that Mike has been waiting for him to remember it, without his help.

Sara, before answering him, gives him a perplexed look that says something close to disbelief that he is really asking her something like that.

'Not like you'd think,' she says finally. 'I had to do what I always do in situations like that.'

'Which was?' he wants to know.

'I made him tell me the other fifty percent of what's in his brain,' is her answer. 'I learned how to do that from you, believe it or not,' she completes, adding a soothing smile.

'From me?'

He has an idea of what she means, but the truth is, he likes that they are being normal like this; just a married couple walking together, running errands together and having a conversation about normal things. The way that he's been deprived of it for too long, he wants to savour all of it, even if that means pushing buttons that he already knows what's behind.

'Yeah,' she nods, 'from interacting with you before. You would give me twenty percent of what was in your head, and just assumed that I understood the rest. Fortunately, I've had time to groom Mike to my convenience without you.'

Because it's a joke, and because he's slowly learning to not take everything to heart about not having been around, he laughs with her. Inside, he does feel a poke of guilt that it's true, she had to go through raising Mike without him, but...

'You make me sound difficult,' he jokes, looking at her fondly.

'You are sometimes,' she tells him. 'It's only that I'm an expert at all things Michael Scofield. Especially how he needed a month to do research for a fishing trip with his son.'

Again with that... She's been teasing him about it all day, and apparently, it's still fresh enough for her to resort to it, _yet again_.

'Sara, I told you,' begins his explanation, soft laughter sounding in his voice, 'I don't know anything about fishing. Mike wouldn't like to be disappointed when none of us know what we're doing at the river.'

He'll also not like to look like a fool in front of his son. Heaven knows that Mike seems to think his dad knows everything, and can do everything, which is why he'd like to live up to that legend.

'But isn't improvising the best part?'

'I like to be prepared,' he tells her seriously. 'Especially when I'm trying to impress my son.'

Through a warm smile, she tells him, 'Trust me, Mike adores you. You don't have to impress him.'

'I hope so,' he says, looking back towards the bait shop, 'because otherwise...'

So as to hear her affirm his place in Mike's heart some more, he turns back to her, only to find that there's no smile on her face. Fine, he doesn't expect her to be smiling at an incomplete sentence, but at least, there should be some lingering aftereffect of a smile from all the jokes that they've been sharing with each other, not a look of horror on her face. The look of horror is not something that he wants to see on her face.

'Sara,' he gasps her name.

He may be one, but it wouldn't need a genius to realise that something is wrong here. Obviously, in his looking away towards the bait shop, he missed the chance to notice the issue that now has Sara looking like this. Something's wrong with his wife, and he can't just stand around and wonder what it is, so to remedy it, he instinctively clutches at her forearm, just to let her know that whatever bad thing she remembered or saw, he's here with her. He also gathers himself together enough, to not panic in front of her, for good measure. Whatever it is that has her like this, he can't jump into panic mode with her. From him, panic will definitely not help.

'Sara…' he calls her again.

He adds a smile to communicate that he won't let the worst overcome her, only to lose it when he hears someone close to them hysterically shout, 'Oh my God! She's shot!'

He clearly hears the words, and he clearly notices that her whole body is beginning to sag, instantly knowing that the person in talking about Sara, hence her sudden strange behaviour, but he doesn't care enough about the words alone, to give them his attention like that. While his mind _does_ hear and process the words, he doesn't do anything to move to inspect where Sara is shot, or where the shot came from. The most important thing to him right now, is to make sure that his wife doesn't hit the ground falling, while he stands around looking for answers that aren't more important than her wellbeing.

'I've got you,' he whispers to her, quickly arranging himself to catch her fall.

Once his hand goes around her back, he feels dampness on a specific spot, and although he immediately knows it's the wound from the shot, it's not useful to him. All right, that's not entirely true, because that piece of information, is useful to him right now just to know not to press his hand over that part of her. Otherwise, with his eyes solely set on her face to see how she's doing through all of this, he only cares to make sure that he doesn't add more shock onto her shock, by starting to freak out with her.

'Listen to me, Sara,' leaves his mouth as a soothing caress, 'I'm right here, and I love you.'

She's in pain, first of all. Secondly, she's scared and probably confused about all this. And lastly, she's lost the fight stay upright. With all of that happening to her, he _cannot_ do anything to add onto what she's already going through. His job, is to be steadfast and assure her with the only truth that should be able to soothe her in this uncertain and disoriented time for her.

'Sara, I love you,' he tells her again without hesitation.

He doesn't want to tell her that she'll be all right, just as he doesn't want to show her his panic, because it will reach her in broken pieces anyway. Being in this kind of sudden situation, it's almost guaranteed that she won't even remember most of it afterwards. What's important and useful to do for her, is speak something to her, that she can carry with her.

'I love you, okay, Sara?'

* * *

Chapter 5, **Emotions.**


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5, **Emotions.**

* * *

It breaks his heart how when he's halfway back into the room, Mike chooses then to look up, and send him a brilliant smile. The smile itself, is not so much the problem as the shine of light in his eyes is. The bright smile, he can somewhat suffer through, unlike the light in Mike's eyes, that's too intense to reach him without effecting him firsthand. The funny thing is, planets and plants could live by the light in Mike's eyes alone, but he…

He is different.

And because he is, his heart is breaking.

His heart is breaking oh-so-much, that it makes him want to tear it out. For even just five seconds, just so as not to feel the anguish of it breaking at the sight of his son giving him something as a preciously lit expression in a bleak time, he wants to pull his heart out. He wishes that he could say that it's only his heart that he wants to tear out of his chest, but he just as equally wants to push Mike out of here, and back to Lincoln's care.

That look from Mike, is another reason why he didn't want his son to be here with him in the first place.

Of course, he didn't anticipate that his son would do something like this, something like redefine the meaning of hope with the light in his eyes. He _had_ , however, given thought to the possibility of Mike -being the child that he is- finding an innocent reason to smile, or simply be innocent. In thinking like that, he had properly anticipated that such innocence from his son, would tear him apart, because he wouldn't be able to offer back a heartfelt positive response. He had feared that he wouldn't even be able to fake a smile, and unfortunately, just as he feared, here he is, feeling nothing less than heartbreak.

Seeing his son looking that optimistic, accurately reflecting more hope than should be allowed to enter his quietly terrified mind, causes him to falter in his step. In a sudden moment, he strongly feels in his soul, that he can't do this with Mike, like he thought he could. He loves his son, more than the world can contain, he loves his son, but he really _can't_ have him here after all. Having his son here, is one more weakness that he shouldn't be seeing right now.

'Dad!' Mike happily exclaims from where he is, when he sees that his smile does nothing to get a reaction from his father.

He tries, on Sara's life he swears that he tries to say Mike's name, but his closing throat stops him. It's _that_ painful to behold Mike, and all that he is at the moment, that he craves to turn his head away and relieve himself even just for a little bit. He doesn't find the courage to turn his head away, he only manages to pull his breath in, for safekeeping in case he desperately needs it later.

'Dad,' Mike repeats just as before, 'Mom's awake! Her eyes are opening!'

Leaving a dangerously empty void in his lungs, where he'd been storing his breath for an emergency, those word suck the breath right out of him.

 _Sara?_ He tries to reach back for his breath.

 _Awake?_ His eyes grow a fraction larger than their usual limit.

It can't be true, his struggling lungs tell him. It's not true, because then, he wouldn't be having this hard a time finding even one breath, to keep his lungs active.

Sara _can't_ be awake. He reasons with his mind.

It's funny, his mind responds to him, for someone who's been claiming to have nothing but hope all of this time, he sure is ready to cast it aside for denial, at the first indication of the manifestation of that hope of his. If he thinks about it, it's like having so much feeling stored up in preparation for something, but when it comes to that feeling meeting the fruit of its existence, it combusts to sticky fear instead.

He's not rejecting the idea of his wife finally being awake like he's been hoping, no. That's not what he's doing, despite his denial. His fear here, is to accept and bask in the possibility of his hope having produced the desired effect as he intended it to do, only to be dashed in a matter of seconds. What his mind doesn't seem to understand, is that seven days are an extremely long time for someone to live on hope, and then just release it into the air like that, for reality. What will happen to him, when the truth about reality shows itself, and it's not what he believed it would be, but his discarded hope is suddenly nowhere to be found, that he can reach out for it, and bring it back to him?

'She's waking up, Dad,' his son repeats with the same shine on his face, consequently drawing a fine crack in his thoughts.

If before, he faltered in his step when he saw Mike splendidly smile at him, he definitely can't move now. His brain, which is responsible for sending commands to his body, is too busy fighting his heart on the subject of Sara being awake, to give the necessary signals for movement. The fact that Mike is acting that way, insisting on repeating the same thing over and over, isn't helping either.

'Is she?' he tentatively dares to ask.

At least, if he can't get his body to move forwards, if he can't do more than look at Mike from where he is, he should say something.

 _Anything._

But _damn it_ , that shine still makes his heart feel like it's breaking.

'Yeah, she is,' Mike replies. 'Come see.'

Mike wouldn't lie to him, he firmly tells himself. It's not even about him not believing Mike all of this time, because there isn't a place inside of him that doubts his son. It's rather about keeping a stronghold on his hope, for a little bit longer, as a way of vaccinating himself against the result of eventually letting it go. But at what price must keeping his hope intact, come? The hurt of his son, or him possibly missing that moment when Sara's eyes come into focus?

No, he decides, enough is enough. He's taken risks for meaningless people before, but he can't dare to brave throwing his steadfast hope aside, for the woman that his life revolves around? If it has to be with his eyelids lightly pressed together, he'll go and see what Mike is calling him to.

Small step by small step, he moves towards Sara. If he could hold his breath during the walk, he would, because he's dead afraid, just doing this. Holding his breath, though, would only scare him more than he already is. It would make him feel like his body torturously shutting down, with every breath that wouldn't be able to take, and so, he keeps from holding his breath. Instead, he walks all the way to his family, just as he is, until he reaches them.

'See?' Mike tests for his reaction, pointing his finger to exhibit his point, as soon as he reaches them.

Oh man… He coaches himself for this.

He's really doing this.

There's no turning back now.

This is it.

As scary as it is, this _is it_.

For just one last attempt at steadying himself to be ready to weather whatever comes next –good or bad-, he closes his eyes for a second. A simple second. In that second, he composes himself, he also robotically trains himself to be that _other_ Michael Scofield, who knows how to store his feelings away for the sake of getting something done. It doesn't take much more than a single thought to summon that other Michael to the surface, but once he has, he opens his eyes again, instantly setting his sight directly on Sara.

At the exact time that he looks at Sara's face, Mike exclaims, 'Mom!' into the open air, clearly overjoyed.

Deliberately, Michael silently swallows a gasp that just tried to burst from his mouth.

His son, is truly a Michael Scofield in the ways that matter. He is a smaller and innocent version of Michael Scofield, but he still one in perfect essence, and that single exclamation, of that single important life-giving word, is the absolute proof of that. Only a Michael Scofield would colour a single word with that much emotion, when it concerns one particular Sara in the world.

Breathing out liberating relief, he reaches out his hand to touch his son's shoulder. With that single act of contact, he means to somehow thank his son for letting out the emotions that he, as an adult, didn't think that he could bear to release without breaking down.

'Sara…' he softly exhales, silently thanking God for bringing her back to him.

Urged by his own silent anticipation, he closely watches as her open eyes slowly move around, to find focus. It feels to him like a century and a half of watching her trying to find focus, and yet, he still braves through the eternity of, until she finds complete focus for her eyes, on Mike.

'Mike?' she softly questions.

Her voice sounds tired, Michael takes in, and automatically, his heart feels the softest of protectiveness towards her, wishing nothing more than to just gather her up into his arms, and silently embrace her as shelter from her fatigue.

'You're awake,' Mike says with as much gladness as he feels.

At Mike's remark, her eyes go searching around the room again. Watching her, he can only imagine, that she is trying to understand where she is, and what the last memory is. When it looks like she is coming up empty on both accounts, she finds him, his eyes specifically, to silently ask what's going on. To provide an answer for her, he softly shakes his head, just as silently telling her that he can't say it in front of Mike.

Thankfully, she understands him, because she turns her attention back to Mike, to ask, 'How long have I been asleep?'

'A long time,' Mike carefully lets out.

A second later, as if he'd been precisely counting down the time to this moment, Mike bursts out into a loud sob as he flings himself onto Sara. Before Michael even has the chance to think that it took Mike long enough to break, though, something of touching magic happens, when Sara immediately reaches to lock their son in that desperate embrace, as though she's been trained to perfection, to respond like that.

He swears, with his breath held, and his eyes tearing, he swears that his heart stops beating. If only to adequately absorb the magic of his family, his heart stops beating.

And he wouldn't have it any other way.

It's almost like he is witnessing his own reunion with Sara from way back then, long after Sona, and a little before the Scylla thing started for them. Although, at the same time, it's also like he's watching himself, as a young boy at his sick mother's beside, holding her tightly, because he sensed that she wouldn't be coming home with him and Lincoln when the night came.

The emotions from those two separate times in his life, leave the archives of his soul, to freely pour with ferocity through his system, just so to remind him that no matter what, he can't lose Sara.

'Mike…' he hears her say to their son. 'I'm a little hungry. Can you get me a chocolate bar?'

Whether she's only using that as an excuse to get Mike out of the room, or she's really feeling hunger, he's not sure of. What he is sure of, is that as soon as Mike steadily pulls away from her, the space will be clear for him to take that step to do the same as Mike did. He's also quite sure that once Mike clears that space for him, he won't be able to fight any urge or pull that is bound to attack him, and so he expertly holds his breath, that way trying to station himself just enough for Sara and Mike to finish their conversation.

Sure enough, when Mike slowly pulls away from her, he feels the strongest tug on his heart to prematurely shove Mike out of his way to Sara. As an adult who can control himself, however, as that same adult who has been keeping himself together for the past days, he catches himself just in time to prevent that impulse. In its place, he rather opts to clench his hands into fists.

'Can I have some money?' Mike asks her, his hand held out.

'Your dad,' Sara softly directs Mike to him.

As Mike turns to him following his mother's gesturing, he quickly remembers that he's strangely grown into the habit of carrying a lot of cash on him. Actually, since being back home, he's developed some strange habits that he doesn't _consciously_ choose, more than, or equal to carrying huge sums of money on him at _all times_. Which is why even before he digs his hand into the pocket of his trousers, he already knows that he's not going to come out with anything less than a hundred. Still, though, after pulling the note out of his pocket, he looks at it, as if he doesn't already know what it is.

'Sorry…' he extends the hand with note to Mike, a sheepish smile on his face. 'This is all I have.'

Mike reaches out to take the note, but Michael pulls the note away from his reach. To anyone else, the simple act may be completely insignificant, but to him, it's actually quite a privilege to do. The fact that he can have that comfortability with his son, to joke around like this, while being a parent in one of the hardest ways (disciplinary reproach), is everything that matters to him.

'Your uncle told me what you did,' he calmly explains the reason for pulling the note away, 'so you have to _promise_ me that you'll get something for yourself too, okay?'

Only after searching his face in a true Michael Scofield manner, does Mike finally give him a timid nod as his promise. Then only, Michael hands him the note, and Mike turns back to Sara.

'Do you want healthy chocolate, or not healthy?' he asks her.

Sara smiles at him before she says, 'Not healthy. I think I'm allowed to, right?'

'Okay,' Mike eagerly nods, just then moving to leave.

Through silence, they wait for Mike to walk out of the room, but every step that he takes to lead out, strengthens Michael's urge to pull his wife into him. His eyes stay focused on hers, obviously, and hers on his, but still, he feels that isn't enough for him. Something close to enough, would be when he stops hearing the trodding of Mike's feet against the smoothly polished hospital, signalling his much-longed-for isolation with her.

It's not that he didn't allow that previous moment between Mike and Sara, to freely be without his interruptions, or any jealousy on his part, because he did. It's only that in this reality, where yes, his wife is awake, and she isn't _just_ in bed with her eyes closed, he's been longing for that sacred moment of him and just her, alone, together… For his own indulgence.

'I've been out a long time, huh?' she whispers, apparently reading the restlessness in his eyes while waiting for Mike to disappear completely.

'What Mike said,' he faintly replies, just as faintly showing her a smile.

'Ah! That explains your um…' she starts, only to deliberately leave it there.

She deliberately left the remark there, he knows, because there is a world of sufficient words that she can use to complete that sentence. He's not complaining about her trailing of, though, because her talking covers the remaining time that Mike needs to completely exit the room. In the second following that lapsed time, after Mike is probably no more than half a step out of the room, Michael leaps through the space between them, and hastily moves to put his arms around her.

His careful logic fails him at this point, that he's not careful to remember that in gathering her up for a proper hug, he could be hurting her. No, that, his mind doesn't seem to register, since his heart only cares that both lengths of his arms circle all of her, and his face finds a comfortable spot on the side of her neck to rest on.

'Uf! Sara seems to complain, except, the words that she speaks next, are more affectionate than an add-on to a complaint. 'That must be a Michael Scofield thing today.'

He appreciates the affection in her voice, because it tells him that he can carry on just as he is, squeezing her, and filling his face with her neck, however, her words make his logic return to him. In returning, his logic reminds him that he should not, for any reason, not even for his own sake, cause Sara any discomfort; be it physically or emotionally. Reasoning that way, he reluctantly separates himself from her, by pulling back from the embrace. He would rather that he didn't, but he respects Sara's being more than what he doesn't want.

'We missed you,' he explains his behaviour to her once he pulls back, 'that's all.'

A soft stroke with his right hand follows him explaining himself to her, and the way that she subtly leans into his stroke, tickles his heart too much for him to contain within him. Really, the effect of it on him, propels him, like a piloting starter to release a greater flame, that explodes through his lips, right onto the skin of her forehead, in a delicately lingering kiss.

'I can imagine,' she softly agrees with him.

While she _does_ wait for him to take his time in removing his lips from her forehead, when he does, he finds a hand of hers waiting for his to take. He instantly takes her hand, making sure to hold as tightly as he can.

'Are you in pain?' he wants to know.

'I don't feel anything yet,' she answers. 'It may just be a delayed effect case, but I don't feel anything.'

Because he trusts her, as his wife first of all, and then as a doctor, he quietly nods to accept her answer, that, but he doesn't find a way to keep from asking her, the one important thing in all of this.

'Do you remember what happened to you?'

'No,' she shakes her head. 'I don't.'

Damn it, he hoped that she would remember. If she remembered, he would've been spared the torture of reliving that terrible moment, just to give it to her. The reality, however, is that she doesn't remember, and that he has to be the one who tells her what really happened to her. For that, he needs to sit down in the chair, just in case mentally reliving that moment becomes too much for him.

'We were looking for the fishing trip goods, and…' he begins, only to pause and stare at her deeply.

In his subconscious, he's hoping that the memory will start coming back to her now, and he will be spared the horror of going back to that day. In his conscious, though, he's simply hoping that she will understand his pause, and fill in the blanks for herself. She does neither, he sees. In fact, all she does, is wait for him to finish what he had been saying, and that is how he realises that he has no choice but to pick up where he left off.

'And…' he lets out a steadying sigh, 'Someone shot you.'

At first, after hearing the words, she only seems to be giving a moment for his words to sink in. When they apparently do, she makes a very _particular_ facial expression. An expression that he's familiar and uncomfortable with.

'Sara...' he tries to stabilise her.

'What else?' her very stoic voice stops his attempt.

With her like that, he knows not to carry on in that line of trying to reel her back in. He knows that he's only getting back to her now, after so many years of being away, but one particular evening at Fox River, and during three other times in the Scylla era, she made expressions similar to this one, _spoke_ to him in a manner similar to this, and he immediately knew to act accordingly. No lies, he knew, no holding back, just frankness.

'Um…' he tries not to falter.

Faltering or not, he tells himself, he has to tell her either way. But, heck, how does he _just_ say this? Where does he start?

'You should know that Gretchen was here,' he continues, lightly squeezing her hand to assure her that she is still here with her, 'and she told me who shot you, but I, um... I didn't do anything about it.'

He stops there, solely to study her face, and see if there is a change, even minimal, on her facial expression. Any change on her face, could mean him stopping his narration altogether, which would honestly be a warm welcome to him. Unfortunately, a seemingly long moment of his staring at her, passes, and that change in expression doesn't come, which forces him to tell her more than he had been willing to spew out just yet.

'I didn't even want the police involved, Sara. I just don't trust them.'

For all he knows, getting the police involved, could mean unveiling another Jacob all over again, and he is so through with that. Really, he's had it to his non-existent grave with conspiracies, consequences and conquests. He just doesn't want to do that anymore, and his singular hope, is that Sara can understand that, at least.

'Okay,' she softly replies, although her expression doesn't change.

Her unchanging expression, makes him feel obligated to push himself forwards in his chair, and cling onto her hand much more than before. An arid and prickly tinge of guilt starts to creep all over his body, finding a rather cosy spot in the centre of his soul, where he can't bear for it to be.

'I just...' he partly laments. 'Sara, I just don't want to do this anymore. All I want, is to finally live the life that I've wanted since...'

Since he first knew that she would give up her life to be with him. Since she told him how she felt about him. Since that train ride to Chicago. Since then, all he's ever wanted was a life with her. Just that. But then so many things happened, that made sure that _that_ didn't happen, and now they are here…

'Since?' she urges, lifting her head a little bit.

'Since always, Sara,' sincerely leaves his mouth. 'And that's why I haven't done anything. Why I don't want to do anything.'

'But I _was_ a specific target, right?'

She's literally asking him, he takes note of, when in truth, she's actually stating that she knows this to be what it really is. He wouldn't have expected her to be naïve about this either way, being who she is, and considering what she's been through since meeting him, and yet, it still stabs him to answer her with a small nod.

'Was it Jacob?' she wants to know.

Shaking his head, he cautiously replies with, 'The actual shooter, no. I don't know if it was him behind the shooter, but I really don't want to find out either.'

Strangely, and yet, at the same time, not strange at all, she squeezes his hand, maybe to show him that she understands him. When she's the one in the hospital bed, the one who took the bullet, she shouldn't have to accept this type of attitude from him, while on the other hand, this, her understanding him, is what he wants from her, hence his strange, yet not strange conclusion. He still feels the need to better explain himself to her, however.

'Listen, Sara,' he begins by anchoring himself with her name, 'finding out who did this to you, could very well mean getting pulled back into that life. I'm scared that before I know it, I'll be forced to leave you and Mike again. I don't want that, Sara. I just want a life with you and Mike.'

For starters, today only, he'd like to take her home right away. What he does, and how he does it at home with her, isn't his main concern, more than just having her back at home with him is.

'That's all I want too,' she gently tells him, 'but whether you do nothing or not, this person will still try to do what they want to do. You of all people should know that Michael.'

'I know that,' he admits, closing his eyes to shut out the weight of those three words.

It's that he really doesn't need a reminder of that very accurate fact, because like she said, he knows better than anyone in their group, what it's like to be a part of _that_ life. He, better than anyone, knows that it never really goes away, but his defence is that there are still such things as hope, and faith. Optimism too, the one thing that he expertly trained himself, on while she was in a coma.

'Then you should probably also know that frankly, I'm sick of it. I swear, Michael,' she begins to tell him, 'I don't care who it is, but whoever is trying to keep you away from Mike and me, I'll kill them myself. Your job would just be to plan it, and make it look like an accident.'

'That, I could totally do,' he lightly jokes back, turning serious right after, 'but you're not getting involved, Sara. I can't lose you.'

'And I can lose _you_?' she quickly challenges, solid urgency evident in her tone.

This is getting far too personal for someone who just woke up from a coma, he realises. He didn't want to lie to her, or keep anything from her, but he didn't think that it would stray this far from him verbally welcoming her back to him. She shouldn't be getting so caught up in this, just a few minutes after waking up.

'Sara…' he exhales, choosing to look away from her, to avoid immediately giving her an answer.

'Michael, look at me,' she calls for his attention. 'Do you really believe that I _can_ lose you?'

Heeding her call, he faces her again with a shaking head, as he answers, 'No. But I _do_ think that you're a little disposed to losing me.'

It wouldn't be fair to say it to her face, but the truth is, he believes that she must have developed a gene within her, that is always subconsciously ready to lose him. He's not going to say that she's strong enough to endure losing him again, he simply believes that were she to lose him, she'd have a part inside of her, that was always ready to lose him at some point or another.

'True,' she wryly agrees, 'but it doesn't hurt any less to lose you, Michael. No matter how many times it happens, I'll always _not_ want to lose you.'

Gently, to empathise with her, he runs his thumb over her hand, to soothe and comfort her, because she is speaking nothing but the truth. In his case, how he can easily empathise with her, he remembers that it never hurt any less whenever he thought he'd lost Sara.

Back when he found out about her overdose, and he thought that he'd never speak to her, because she wouldn't want anything to do with him, it didn't hurt less.

Gosh, back on the horrible day, when he felt like his lungs were failing him, after he read her note in that motel room, it didn't hurt any less either.

Even back when she didn't make it onto the ship with him and Lincoln, when he already had the experience of losing her, it didn't lessen the pain that he felt.

He remembers how back in Sona, when his brother gave him the news of her death, less, was far from the hollow pain that he felt.

Also back when he thought sending her off to a safer place with Sucre, would keep her safe from the hands of The Company, it didn't hurt less than any other time before.

When he realised that he had to leave her and their baby behind, to keep them safe, it didn't hurt his soul less, for anything.

Back in Crete too… Oh, gosh, back in Crete… Seeing her leave, and wondering if she would change her mind, and decide to stay with Jacob after all, hadn't hurt less. He swears that it didn't hurt less, even when he placed his hand over his heart to appease it.

Every single time that he felt he had lost her, it wasn't any easier than the previous time. If anything, it was harder to swallow down for his digestive system to begin its work. And that is how he can empathise with her now. Not simply because she is his wife, and they are joined at the soul, also because he's lived through losing her.

'I know, Sara,' he sympathetically says to her, 'but I still don't want you to be involved in anything this time. Mike needs you.'

'That's what you're going with?' she half snorts, cynicism speaking through it. 'Mike needs me?'

He doesn't answer her immediately, because it's so much more meaningful for him to just take a moment, and think about this, about her. She, on the other hand, lets go of his hand, to instead play with a button on his shirt.

'After all this time,' she confesses, 'I was hoping that you needed me too.'

Oh, he lightly gasps, if she only had a tangible visual of the depth, of how much he needs her. He simply needs her just to be, but with such rooted depth feels that need, that he wouldn't be able to put it into words. Granted, he doesn't want to physically lose her, he ultimately doesn't need for her to be right there with him, in order to need her. No, his need for her, is as basic as her being alive, and yet, just being that basic, it's completely infinite.

'I need you,' he simply says to her, hoping his feelings have seeped into his words for her to hear them.

He simply says that, not adding the appropriately conjugated form of the verb 'to do', as an affirmation of the fact, because an affirmation wouldn't be adequate. A simple undoubtable declaration, is perfect. The effect has her

'I need _you_ ,' she lovingly declares back, abandoning his shirt button to intently look up at him. 'So, we need to do this together, Michael. I don't like the thought of getting back into that life. I mean… I've been normal and basic for so long now that I don't... I don't want to do this, Michael. I really don't, but here I am in hospital bed, and the scary thing about me being in this bed, is that Mike could be in it next.'

Oh!

No, _tha_ t, is not… No. Just no.

'Sara, don't-' he starts to warn her, but she cuts him off.

'It's possible,' she urgently sits up. 'That me from the Scylla days, would've liked to believe that we could somehow stay out of trouble, but after learning that you were taken from me all this time, I'm not going to be naïve, Michael. We have a son now, and you're right, maybe I am a little disposed to losing you, but I am not losing Mike. For my son, I'd kill the American president with my own hands. _No one_ is touching my son.'

If he wasn't too busy convincing himself that he can't allow Sara to get back into that chaotic life, he'd definitely take the time to appreciate, just how much he loves that assertive side of hers. Maybe, if he had a little time to go beyond merely appreciating her, he'd even do something physical and intimate about that appreciation of his, with her.

But for now, he can only sigh, because in all seriousness, he doesn't want that life for her. If he'd wanted it for her, he wouldn't have left her in the first place. He would've otherwise found a way to keep her with him, wherever he went, and took care of her personally.

'Sara, that life is never-ending,' he tiredly reminds her. 'What if we're forced to separate again? Do you even remember Crete? I barely saw you for two minutes, and then you had to leave? Sara, I'm not losing my family again. I just want to be with you and Mike. I want to plan fishing trips for five months and… I don't know, maybe have a sister for Mike…'

'Aha-haha,' softly ruptures from her mouth, delicately filling the air between them with a light break from the tension of disagreeing with each other. 'Okay, first of all,' she speaks through a smile, 'as smooth as that last part was, you're not getting anywhere near me with that shirt on you.'

He looks at the said shirt, only to remember that a certain doctor took pity on him and brought him a change of clothes, from his blood covered once from the shooting scene. A small smile spreads on his face as soon as he realises that it's not really his style to wear a flannel shirt. He's more of a solid colours man, not two to three intertwined colours in one piece of fabric.

'Well,' he looks back at her, keeping the smile on his face, 'I'll have to return it to Doctor Mercer then.'

Pulling a face that speaks of her incomprehension, she asks, 'Doctor Mercer?'

'Later,' he offers, because he doesn't want to get into that now.

'Okay,' she nods, 'but really, Michael, we can't have a normal life anymore. Not now that you're back.'

Oooh, he feels a sharp stab in the centre of his heart. That really stung. It still does, if he's being honest.

While he knows that she didn't mean that maliciously, it still stings. It stings to be reminded that with him, the man that loves her to the end of the world, she can't have a normal life. It stings even more, knowing that just as he believes that she has grown a gene disposed to losing him, she's also grown another one alongside it, that's strictly for always expecting the worst to happen, with him around.

'I didn't mean it like that,' she quickly apologises upon realising the effect of her words on him.

'It's true, though,' he takes full responsibility, only attempting to placate her reception of that, with a lopsided smile. 'I just want so badly to hope that it isn't, because I can't deal with anymore of this, Sara. I don't want to be old and grey, and still doing some planning, or other.'

'You're already grey,' she jokes, using one of her fingers to point at his hair, 'so there's one thing off the list.'

He opens his mouth to respond with a joke of his own, except, in the corner of his eyes, he spies Mike coming back into the room. Instantly, he turns his attention to their son, and instantly, he notices what Mike has in his hands.

His heart.

He'd only meant to stop his and Sara's polite arguing in time, so that Mike didn't hear them, but he hadn't been prepared to have his heart quake at the sight of what Mike has in one of his hands.

Sara was, no, _is_ right, trouble will come to him, either way.

'Mom…' Mike calls as he walks to them, 'These are for you. A woman gave them to me. She said her name is Penny, and she didn't want to come inside because you and Dad were talking.'

Penny.

Michael feels his heart quake again.

Even without hearing the name, Michael would've still been disturbed, because the bouquet of flowers, he recognises. From the time that Gretchen had come here, he recognises those same flowers, and remembering how Gretchen had mentioned a Penny, it didn't take five seconds for his brain to add everything up, to the perfect sum.

'Penny?' she questions Mike.

'That's what she told me,' is Mike's innocent answer.

'Well, I don't like flowers, but you can put them on that table over there.'

While Mike walks back to the table, that's all the way close to the door, Sara leans to him.

'Who's Penny?' she wonders.

'It's her,' is his simple answer, even though his eyes are set on the flowers.

He swears, those flowers, he'll throw out from this room. He can't have any reminder of the person who tried to take his life, close to him.

'Wow,' she lightly exclaims through a breath. 'I can't believe this. She got close to Mike. Michael, I don't care what you say about not getting involved, I'm going to Fox River. I'm going to see Jacob. No one is going to take my son from me.'

No, she's not going to Fox River, he internally sighs.

She's not going to see Jacob.

 _He is._

Against his will, against his hope for a spotless future with his family, all for the love of the woman that's here with him, he'll risk getting dragged away from her. Yet again.

'I'll go to Fox River,' he resigns. 'You just get better for me. Please.'

'We-' she tries to argue with him, only, Mike interrupts her.

'Dad.'

'Yeah?' he turns to Mike.

'I got you something to eat too,' Mike lets him know. 'Uncle Lincoln said that you stayed here with Mom the whole time. You must be pretty hungry.'

'A little. Thank you, Mike,' he smiles at his son.

And thank God for Mike's timing _this_ time. If mike hadn't interrupted Sara, he just knows that he wouldn't have liked to continue discussing the issue of Sara going to see Jacob, and in Fox River, no less. If there are three things that he never wants around Sara ever again, they are Jacob, Jacob and Fox River. If he has to sell his soul, he'll do it to make sure that Sara is kept from those three things all of her life.

For the immediate future, though, before he has to consider selling his soul to the highest bidder, he'll start off by going to Fox River. He won't like it. He'll hate it in fact. He'll hate seeing that face again, and he'll hate looking into the eyes of the man who betrayed him, stole his family, and had his friend, except, he has to do it. For Sara, to keep her away from all of this, he'll go to Fox River.

After Fox River, his brain starts to organise, he's heading straight to a stationery shop, because other than a massive board for a plan, he'll need a lot of drawing pins. And post-it notes. Maybe some tape too. Also… Alex. Specifically from a stationery shop, he'll need to call Alex.

* * *

Chapter 6, **Falling Inside The Black.**


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6, **Falling Inside The Black.**

* * *

It's now time to go.

He feels it, but after spending so many days at Sara's side, and just now having a family moment, eating, laughing and talking, Michael finds it difficult to leave. He has done many difficult things in his life, most of them founded in the fact that he didn't want to do them in the first place, but rather found himself in the plane of having no better choice, however, this, really leaving Sara, is one of the more burdensome things that he has ever had to endure in his life. Only an hour has passed since she awoke, and he already has to leave her?

He's really to just get up and make the decision to leave the safety of seeing her face every hour of the day, for the uncertainty of not knowing when he might see her next, once he steps foot out of the hospital? What would happen if say, he didn't get the chance to get back to her for a week, and when he finally returned to her, she'd only have the memory of how he left her lying in a hospital bed? He needs to communicate his fears to her as much as he can, without alerting Mike of them, because it's important that she knows his position in this; that he in no way wants to leave her side.

'I'll be fine,' she quietly tells him. 'Mike will be here looking after me.'

That's not the point, he wants to tell her. It's not a question of her being all right on her own, or not having people around her, to care for her. What it is, is that he's got this firmly fixed dread that once he leaves this hospital room, a reality that he doesn't want to get into, will be waiting for him with widely spread arms, leaving no room for him to evade that coldly welcoming embrace.

'Sara…' he tries to stay his departure, searching her eyes and face for an inkling of understanding.

'Michael Scofield,' she returns through a faint smile.

It's obvious that she understands him, he observes. That faint smile of hers, more or less says that to the extent that she's able to, seeing as she's not him and can never really get into his feelings the way that only he can, she understands that he is pleading with her to understand what he doesn't want to do. Her smile also says that although she understands, she cannot allow him to get what he wants, not when she's not the only person to be cared for in this anymore.

That's a fair argument. Too valid, in fact, he thinks.

The thing is, though, if he absolutely has to, he would really rather wait until she is back at home and fully recovered, before he gets into dealing with Jacob again. Sara, however, in a manner true to how he knows her, sees through his silent reluctance, because almost immediately, she told inclines her head towards Mike, once again reminding him that there's a potential threat hanging over Mike's life, making him heed her plea over his own discomfort and fears.

'Okay,' he relents with a small nod. 'I'll go.'

'Thank you, Michael,' she says.

 _Anything for you, Sara_ , he thinks as he leans down to kiss her cheek as a goodbye. He'd do anything for her with no option of debate. As the woman he loves, her struggles and discomfort automatically become his struggles and discomforts, thus, he would do anything to make sure that she is at ease, _whatever_ extreme that could mean for him.

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 **26Chapters**

* * *

At the time, he didn't think that it was possible to stay home longer than a quick shower and a change of clothes, but his detour home, made him realise just how much rest he needed. Moments after entering his room with the plan to take a quick refreshing shower, and then change into his own clothes before going out again, his eyes landed their bed, and then just spontaneously, his mind drew into the thought to lay down on it for a while. The thought grew into him walking to the bed, and before he really registered what he was doing, he was already setting the alarm to wake him up later on.

That had been some hour and various minutes ago, and now that he has slept and cleaned up, he's thankful for taking that short nap to pull himself together. In order to see Jacob in prison, he's going to have no less than a sharp and alert mind.

Jacob.

Just… Jacob Ness.

His skin is beginning to heat up at just the thought of that man. He'd been somewhat pacified from the fight inside, between his emotions and logic in connection to what he ought to really do about this. Through packing a few books (reading and writing), a tablet computer for Sara and selecting one or three games for Mike to take back to the hospital, he'd coached himself to feel pacified in sense, only, now that he's thought of Fox River and in turn, Jacob Ness, the pacifier has stopped working. And all over again, he's back to thinking as he is inclined to do the majority of the time that he is awake.

The thing is, he'd had a plan.

Not the one where he caught up with normal life, and started living the life which he should've been doing from the beginning with his family, but the one concerning the current situation. He'd had the plan to ignore it all, in the solid hope that it would all go away, if he did that. He'd been convinced that he would succeed in ignoring things too, but then his Gretchen showed up. Out of the blue, that woman showed up with flowers for Sara. And then his brother showed up, with Mike, no less. And lastly, but obviously far from the least, Sara woke up, telling him right away that he _should_ get involved, or else _she_ would.

To put it plainly, his plan broke apart.

It would be unfair of him to put the blame of the falling apart of his plan on his brother and wife, but truly, if they would just understand precisely how easy it is for him to slip into that life again, he knows that they wouldn't be encouraging him towards that path. If they could just take into consideration for example, how they had so quickly slipped back into running and chasing mode, hiding and evading at whatever end, since they learned that he was alive… Sara for one, had literally dropped everything, risked everything to cross the oceans and get to him, just like she did in Panama, right after Fox River, and…

Thinking this with a lamenting sigh, he just wishes that they understood. He wishes that they understood to the right extent that in that line of life, necessity quickly fades into a lifestyle, and once the lifestyle is cracked into, whether you want to be there or not, you remain in there, feeding from that lifestyle. That life is toxic poison posed as 'having no other option,' and soon enough, he will start feeling like he's falling inside the black of a hole, where no light can reach him, to guide him out of. Once he gets into this, there's a big possibility that he might not want to find a way out…

He has Sara and Mike to think of, though, his entire world, for whom he would not hold anything back from doing. The truth is, if he doesn't get involved, that will leave the responsibility to Sara, and what is he going to do, let Sara be the one to take the fall?

No, never.

She's far too valuable, which is why he's reaching across the dining table, to get his phone from there. Taking the phone in his hand, he quickly dials the number that he asked his brother to get for him. Easily, on his own, he could've gotten Alex's number, he only needed to do things the normal way for once. Even now, he still wants to believe what he believed then, and that is that if he behaves normally enough, the unfolding that is to follow, will naturally lead to a normal outcome as it should be. He's hoping to discover in taking the normal route of doing things, that Penny is just a random person, who does random things, for random reasons, and that really, she's no threat to his family.

Just as he starts to dial the number, in any case, very aware of the fact that things can always go the way that is not planned or wanted. As he places the phone over his ear to hear the ringing begin, he closes his eyes and pushes out a breath that leaves his lungs wanting, because he wasn't supposed to be pushing it out in the first place. He feels so unprepared to be doing this, that he is mixing up his breathing pattern… But okay, this is it. He's on the second ringing sound, and…

'Hallo?' the female voice on the other end cordially greets.

That's not the voice that he had been waiting to hear, and it should frustrate him a little bit that he has to go through her to get to Alex, he's not going to be picky about it. While Felicia being the primary person that he's talking to is actually more of a load than he would like to carry at the moment, he needs to sort this out as soon as possible, even if means going through her.

'Hello…' he slowly lets out at first, silently composing himself in the brief pause that he takes before adding, 'Felicia.'

'Uh…' is all she replies with, and he can clearly picture her confusion on the other side.

'It's um… It's Michael. Michael Scofield,' he tells her.

' _Michael Scofield_?' she asks, her voice picking up more vigour than before. ' _The_ Michael Scofield?'

 _Him_ , he thinks as silently sighs, because why she has to make it sound like he's the president of the world and more, he doesn't understand.

'Yeah, um… Me,' he agrees.

'Wow!' she exclaims in loud wonder. 'We heard talk of it, but… It's really you. Wow. So uh, welcome back, I guess?'

'Thanks,' he nods even though she can't see him. 'Um, is Alex there? I need to talk to him.'

'I'm sorry, you just missed him,' she answers. 'He didn't take his phone with him, but should I… Do you want me to-?'

'No, it's fine,' he quickly interrupts her.

It's a lie, though. It's not fine that he just missed Alex, because he needs to speak to Alex, and soon. He is on a timeline, and he has it planted in his head that if he messes up, everything will start falling out of place, leaving a disastrous mess as the aftermath.

'Oh… Uh,' Felicia seems to be stringing words together on the other end for a moment, and then only comes together with the coherent statement of, 'Alex's very glad that you're back, Michael. We all are.'

He would laugh at that, if it wouldn't make him feel like an idiot, seeing as those words are disturbingly contradictory to the reality of his wife lying in the hospital, recovering from a gunshot. If they are all glad to have him back, is that why his wife was shot in the back, and he is being pulled into something that he doesn't want to get into? If that's what it means to be glad to have someone back, then he doesn't want to get beyond that and onto the side of someone being bothered by his return.

'Yeah,' he curtly agrees, only to put an end mostly to his own bitter feelings. 'Listen Felicia, I'll call Alex back.'

'Okay, yeah. Sure,' she agrees, to which he hangs up.

He'll unfortunately need to get in touch with Alex later, because for now, he needs to go to Fox River.

* * *

 **26Chapters**

* * *

On his life, he swears that for as long as he lives, he will _never_ forget Fox River Penitentiary. Above all the other prisons that he's been in, Fox River is the place where he changed. Inside there, he found Sara, freed his brother, and also made the most amazing of friends. Heck, even though meeting T-Bag had not been welcomed, knowing T-Bag inadvertently gave him someone important down the line, and so he can and never will forget Fox River.

Upon entering the visitation area, he finds that he recognises no guards, which leads him to wonder if Henry Pope is doing all right in life. And thinking of Henry, maybe before he gets sucked into all this nonsense again, he should go and visit the man, just to apologise one last time for messing up his life in the way that he had done all those years ago. Yeah, he'll do that. He wonders about Katie too. Sara said that they never kept in touch, but he wonders if she is here still. It wouldn't be hard for her to still be here. Some people stay in the same job for years and more.

The guard leads him to the visitation and waiting, he thinks of the time that he had been in here, coming from the other end. He thinks of the good times. Meeting Sara in the infirmary…

'Michael Scofield…'

All of a sudden, he's impatient. That voice, is venom to his senses, the poison that slurps away at his blood, making him feel cold-blooded and emotionless, as well as passionately loathing towards the snake. T-Bag and Bellick in their early stages, combined with Lechero, Sammy, Krantz and everyone that ever hurt Sara, have nothing on his hatred for Jacob Ness. He hates him the most for Sara, mostly Sara.

'Sit down, Jacob,' he orders.

To his surprise, Jacob does. He had expected that Jacob would make a fuss and maybe gloat, but he easily takes his seat, cleverly keeping his shackled hands out of site.

'Let me guess,' he starts with an annoying smile. 'Sara misses me, and she sent you to get me.'

He'd been too quick to think that Jacob would be unlike himself. Of course he would do something like mention Sara. The goat. He exhales. He should've known to expect for Jacob to make some type of comment about Sara.

'Come on, Michael, what's that face?' Jacob asks. 'Don't tell me you're offended that I asked. I mean, Sara's just like that, you should know. You had her, and then I had her, and now she wants me to have her back.'

Michael exhales again. The mental picture of Jacob even reaching out his hand to stroke Sara's hair, is the worst kind of torture in the world. But he cannot let his composure go. Although, there's some truth there, Jacob did truly have her for a moment.

'You have exactly…' he looks at his watch, 'Eleven minutes to tell me exactly what you know about Penny.'

'I'd rather talk about Sara,' Jacob shrugs, making it seem like he is innocent. 'And Mike.'

He is going to lose his mind, really, he is going to explode in a moment, and then he will hurt Jacob…

'Mention my wife and son one _more_ time.'

'And you'll what? Have my dinner kept from me? Look around Michael, I'm sure you can still recognise this place.'

He's not the one in chains, though. Even if there is nothing that he can physically do to Jacob at the moment, he is not the one who has a controlled life.

'Talk,' he orders, giving the man one last chance.

'About Sara and Mike?' Jacob asks with fake innocence, adding a mocking laugh at the end.

That does it, Michael decides, consciously losing what little patience he had, and pushing out of his chair. He'd made the choice to endure this, so that Sara wouldn't have to, but this he promises, that he _never_ again will he come to see this man. It would be too much of a gift for Jacob to receive a visitor in the entertainment form of someone under whose skin he can get under.

As if he doesn't understand what is going on, and why it's suddenly happening this way, Jacob asks, 'What's wrong, Michael? Was it something I said?'

That smirk on Jacob's face is all the taunting that he can take, that's what's wrong. Even if it hadn't been that, and he had been willing to take more from the man kept prisoner behind the glass, it's suddenly clear to him that with Jacob, he's simply wasting his time. Not only does that foul man want to go about defiling his family's names in his mouth, it's also very clear that he has nothing and no idea on this Penny person. Jacob is too much of a power hungry cat, the kind highly aroused by the fact they know something that someone else doesn't, to keep absolutely quiet about what he knows.

About Penny, Jacob obviously has no clue, and because of that, he turns his back on the man who had once been sending him on missions. As he begins to walk away, Jacob calls for him, no doubt looking to provoke him, but he doesn't lose his composure and turn back. His sole focus now, is making sure that he gets to Alex, since he is the only one who can apparently provide him with the information he needs to have.

* * *

 **26Chapters**

* * *

As much as he should have gotten to dialling Alex's number and getting in touch with his old trusted friend, he really had to sit down in his car and mentally rinse himself of the sticky debris that Jacob left him with. It's been over six minutes, he estimates, and he's still working on cleansing his mind of the provoking that the other man did. The thing that makes all of Jacob's words remain in his head, is that there is a ring of truth to them. He can't even deny that Sara had married Jacob, just like he can't deny that-

Para-para-pap.

That soft sound, clearly coming from the window of his passenger's seat, gets in the way of him completing his thoughts. If only it was about the knocking, more than it is about him getting his guard up on why that woman responsible for making that sound, chose that specific window to do it at.

Para-para.

She knocks on the window again, adding a smile to her knock, but still Michael doesn't like that she is communicating to him from the passenger's window. He can only assume that by her doing that, she wants for him to open the window on that side, and that in itself does not make sense, seeing as he is all the way on this side of the car.

'I just want to talk to you,' she tells him.

The sound of her voice reaches him in a muffled way, but reaches him all the same, so raising a suspicious eyebrow, not at all in the mood to be polite.

'Please open the door,' she asks of him. 'I really want to talk to you.'

He'll roll down the window a little bit, but he will not open the door. After Jacob, and even worse, here in the Penitentiary parking lot, he does not want to worse than he already is.

'May I help you?' he wants to know after rolling down the window.

'I have a gun…' she starts and then pauses.

Going by her pause alone, he immediately decides that he doesn't like this. Different reason could be part of why she is talking to him, but what he is sure of is that he does not want even a little part of whatever her problem is. She looks like a well put together person, even beautiful, if he is being honest, but his experience has drilled it into his mind that the more put together someone looks, the more likely that they are unhinged in a very dangerous and sadistic way. The worst of the worst, know how to hide their stench.

She could be one of those worst of the worst people, which is why he carefully looks around to see if there are any hidden people somewhere. He finds nothing out of the ordinary, but still, he doesn't feel relieved. There is just something about the woman knocking on the passenger's window that makes him feel like protecting himself. He can only hope that she does not recognise him from anywhere in this city.

'Who are you?' he asks.

'Petra,' she answers politely. 'May I come inside the car, please?'

'No,' he quickly shuts her down. 'What do you want, _Petra_?'

'I was saying that I have a gun,' she tells him. 'And this gun of mine, it originally had three bullets, but I've added a fourth now. Well, technically, it's going to be the third, because bullet number one already shot Sara.'

He had been expecting the worst, it's only that he didn't believe that the worst would be concerning him. At the very best, he thought that he would have an associate of Jacob try to harass him some more, but he never actually gave it the thought that he would be hearing something that is a nuclear bomb to his system.

He's taken by shock at first. Just shock, that he can't really react, more than he can only replay the second part of the sentence that Petra relayed to him. And then, after he replays it, and he recognises the name Sara, his wife, his mind registers, and how she was already shot by the first bullet, he allows that to sink in. As it sinks in, he feels the softest of tinges touch the outer nerves of his skin, surprisingly beginning there, instead of beginning in his heart.

'Penny,' he breathes to himself as his body catches up with the information in his mind.

The person who shot Sara, the person responsible for making his life a tight ball of hope these past days is apparently at his passenger window, and he can't, for the life of all that is precious to him, find it within himself to boil up with anger and explode at her. He somehow wants to attribute his quiet feelings to the thoughts of positivity that he has been housing all the time that he has spent at Sara's side, but in reality, he knows.

He knows with clear certainty that the real reason for him not getting into the negatives of exploding, is that in his heart, he does not feel comfortable about getting back into the life that he left behind, and if he does so much as get angry right now, he will, in that way, be acknowledging that it the time has really come for him to get back to running and chasing and planning. Oh hell, the planning...

It's not even the planning that he is afraid of. No, planning is something he can do with boy of his eyes closed while Sara is wrapped all around him and he is pleasurably encased within her, and all he can think is staying that way for eternity. The thing about planning is that well-

'My name's Petra,' she sweetly corrects him during the silence. 'I've always hated that my name's short, and I couldn't get a nickname out of it. But I'm living on the edge these days, so I've decided to go by Penny.'

Somewhere during her speech, he focused all of his visual attention on her, and thus took the time to study her. Like he thought before, she is a beautiful one to look at, but Sara being who she is to him, her beauty means nothing to him. Her smile is also not sinister looking, and he cannot say why, but she doesn't give of the air of the worst of the worst. Even the way that she delivered how she has a gun, and how she shot Sara, she didn't seem to want to rub it in his face in that, 'I can hurt you forever and ever, if I choose,' way... He just doesn't know...

'You seem normal,' absently comes from his thoughts.

Smiling, she replies with, 'I am normal.'

No she's not, he silently scoffs.

'You shot my wife, Petra.'

There's nothing about that deranged act that makes you normal, because normal people do not go around shooting others for the fun of it.

'And your son will be next,' she says to him through a smile. 'And then his little dog after him, but I'll still be normal then.'

Right now would be a perfect time to lose his cool. Right this moment, would be a good time to quickly manoeuvre his car in a way that he manages to damage her for attempting to harm his little innocent boy, because much like Sara, he will not allow his son to be the target of anyone's intent. But, he cannot get angry in the way that he wants to. He went through that emotion during the first hour that the doctors took Sara away from him. Of course, now that he's seeing the responsible party, he should be flaming to the marrow, but he knows better. Anger leads to mistakes, and mistakes lead to losing answers. He cannot afford to lose answers, not even a crumb of one, if he intends to get to the root of this thing, so he needs to keep himself together.

'What do you want from me?' he evenly presents to her, looking her right in the eyes. 'Who's really behind this?'

'I want to play with you,' she says, shrugging a little like it means very little to her. 'I put my cards out on the table, so you know what my plan is. I only want you to try and prevent me from winning. That's what games are for, right? One person attempts to win, and the opponent attempts to stop them from doing so, and if they get it right, they win in the end. Right, Michael?'

He doesn't believe her, but what he says to her is, 'Tell me what you want from me.'

Frowning a little, her answer is, 'I just told you. I want to play a game with you. Nothing more than that. I swear there's no one behind me,' she lifts her hands up in surrender, 'and I swear I'm all by myself, so _let's_ play.'

'I'm not interested,' he coldly tells her, because he can't think of how else to tell her.

'Michael, I just…' she pauses, only to make a dramatic sighing noise, and then continue. 'Why do you win everything? You have to lose somewhere, right? I mean, don't you get tired of winning all the time?'

'Stay away from my family, Petra,' he says, but even he knows that that is nowhere near enough.

In his mind, he already knows that she has something planned, and as much as she said that she plans to shoot Mike next, he literally cannot do anything to her, that will not land him back in Fox River, probably sharing a cell with Jacob.

'I don't want to,' she whines, and he uses that time to roll up his window and reduce the sound of her voice to a muffled thing.

So what now, Michael?'

What is he supposed to do now? Does he go about and dig up information about her? Does he protect his family, and how, at that? Or what, does he just go on living like nothing ever happened, because...

* * *

Chapter 7, **Gates Of Pearl.**


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